Nelly Korda started her 2026 campaign with a win and then added two major and one more regular event victories to her resume. However, she was struggling during the opening round at the Amundi Evian Championship 2026. The stakes are much higher for her at the fourth major of the year. Besides the financial benefits and world ranking points, she has a chance to complete her career Grand Slam and also enter the LPGA Hall of Fame. But her first round kicked her out of the top 100 on the leaderboard.
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She started on the back nine and made a birdie on the 12th. After saving par on the next few holes, she made the turn with a bogey on the 18th. But things changed on the front nine. On the par-4 1st hole, she succumbed to a double bogey. That appeared to have derailed her momentum.
Nelly Korda picked up two more bogeys on the 4th and the 5th. A late birdie on the 9th helped her finish at three over 74. It was Nelly Korda’s putting that was causing the problem. She hit 11 of the 13 fairways, and her average driving distance was 276 yards. She also reached 13 of the 18 gre It seems like she carried the putting struggles she had in the final two rounds at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship here.
During the third major of the season, the 27-year-old started with rounds of 70 and 68 and was well in contention. She gained 0.594 and 2.744 strokes in putting on Thursday and Friday but lost over 1.170 and 1.592 strokes in the third and fourth rounds, respectively. This blew her chances of winning the third major in a row, as she ended tied for 8th on the leaderboard.
“You can’t win it on the first day, but you can definitely lose it,” she said during her post-round conference of the third major of the season.
This time, though, Nelly Korda didn’t speak to the media. And it seems like what she said about losing an event on the first day has come true. After her opening round, she is tied for 108th on the leaderboard as of publishing.
She was more than 10 shots behind the leader. At this point, she is completely out of contention, and it reflects on her betting profile, too. The bookmakers who gave her 4/1 odds of winning pre-tournament have now pushed her to 50/1. She was already wary of the course, and it is already showing its fangs.
“Evian is special in itself, where … you hit some really good shots, and they end up in the complete wrong areas, and that’s just kind of how it is. It’s all about patience this week,” she said during her pre-event press conference about the unique challenges of the event and the Evian Resort Golf Club.
“What I learned every year is that patience is key out here. I’m still figuring it out. Like it’s Year 10. Every year I learn something new about this place. So, yeah, it’s just Evian,” the World No. 1 added in her pre-tournament press conference.
Does the added pressure of completing a grand slam and entering the LPGA Hall of Fame weigh on her? She will be the first American since Juli Inkster to do both. But Nelly Korda denied it while performing her media duties yesterday by saying, “I think I just try to spin it, of yeah, some people may think it’s a lot of pressure, but I think I’m just really proud of myself for even putting myself into that position and it being talked about.”
However, being the World No. 1 and playing for the career Grand Slam and the two points that could get her into the LPGA Hall of Fame can be overwhelming.