The return of golf at the Olympics will do wonders for the timeless sport’s public exposure, and most especially for the women from the LPGA Tour, who will get a chance to shine on the brightest of all athletic-competition stages. But who exactly do the experts predict will take home a gold medal from Rio this week? Let’s find out below.
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Rio 2016 Summer Olympic Women’s Golf Expert Picks and Predictions
Bleacher Report
Expert
Gold
Ben Alberstadt
Lydia Ko
Ben Alberstadt of Bleacher Report went with the obvious choice of picking New Zealand’s Lydia Ko, who is also the +275 overall favorite to win gold in Rio.
Ko’s achievements in just a little over two years as a pro reads like a laundry list of any LPGA Hall-of-Famer. The 19-year-old of Korean descent already has 50 career top-10 finishes and 11 victories, with four of those wins coming from 2016 alone.
She’s also the youngest female golfer on the tour to win a major (The Evian Championship in 2015), and she also bagged another major title victory this year at the ANA Inspiration in April. No wonder most experts on this here feature are high on the next Tiger Woods of the women’s golfing circuit.
Golfweek
Expert
Gold
Silver
Bronze
Jim McCabe
Lydia Ko
Brooke Henderson
Lexi Thompson
Jeff Babineau
Lydia Ko
Brooke Henderson
Azahara Munoz
Adam Schupak
Lydia Ko
Brooke Henderson
Ariya Jutanugarn
Brentley Romine
Brooke Henderson
Lydia Ko
Charlie Hull
Alex Miceli
Ariya Jutanugarn
Lydia Ko
Lexi Thompson
Three out of the five pundits from Golfweek weren’t shy to declare Ko as their favorite to win gold, but two of them placed the Kiwi as a runner-up instead. Alex Miceli, in particular, was high on Thailand’s Ariya Jutanugarn (+650) to bring home the best piece of hardware from the tournament for the proud Southeast-Asian nation.
Jutanugarn entered Rio with a superb major-tournament victory from the Ricoh Women’s British Open late July to give her four wins for the season, and her three other victories were all won in succession this May.
As such, the 20-year-old Bangkok native remains right behind Ko in the 2016 Race to CME Globe and the money rankings alike, and an Olympic gold medal may be the massive psychological boost she needs to overthrow the best female golfer from her perch atop the LPGA Tour before the current season ends.
SB Nation
Expert
Gold
Silver
Bronze
Emily Kay
Lydia Ko
Ariya Jutanugarn
Anna Nordqvist
Brendan Porath
Brooke Henderson
Lexi Thompson
Ariya Jutanugarn
Here we have another gold-medal prediction for Ko by way of SB Nation’s Emily Kay. However, Kay’s colleague in Brendan Porath went with Brooke Henderson as his top pick, giving the Canadian a second backer amongst the experts on this here feature.
Henderson – a fantastic sleeper pick to win gold this week in Rio at +1,200 – has participated in more tournaments this season (21) than any other golfer in the top 10 of the Race to CME Globe standings. The hard work put in by the 19-year-old from Ontario has paid off greatly, as she now has a major title (from the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship in June) plus another victory to show for. Henderson’s 11 top-10 finishes is also tied with Ko for the most in the current LPGA Tour season.
