By the time Nelly Korda wrapped up her media obligations and finished signing autographs for the young fans who stuck around to meet the newest winner of the Chevron Championship, darkness had already descended on The Woodlands, Texas.
Korda had just capped a historic run of golf in which she won five consecutive events, matching Hall of Famers Nancy Lopez and Annika Sorenstam as the only women to accomplish that feat. In celebration of capturing the first major of the season, as is tradition, Korda leaped into the water beside the 18th green at the Club at Carlton Woods alongside her devoted inner circle – swing coach Jamie Mulligan, caddie Jason McDede, agent Chris Mullhaupt and athletic trainer Kim Baughman (as pictured above, in order, at the 2024 Rolex Awards).
“By having a great team around me full of positivity and working hard, hard work will always get you somewhere,” Korda told the media that Sunday.
Korda and her team were riding high on adrenaline, perhaps the only chemical strong enough to keep them on their feet. It was 8:30 p.m., but the team had been up since 4 a.m. in preparation for a marathon day in which Korda had to complete the weather-delayed third round, leading to 24 holes Sunday.
And they were hungry.
Inside the dining area of the ladies locker room, the champion ate with the four members of her team, in addition to her parents, Petr and Regina; her brother, Sebastian; and McDede’s wife, professional golfer Caroline Masson, and their son, Benton. Korda immediately withdrew from the next event on the LPGA schedule and the group started rebooking their flights.
As the dinner unfolded over the next two hours, the energy that had propelled the group through an epic stretch slowly dissipated as the team was able to relax for the first time in months. They captured the moment by taking a group photo in which they all held up five fingers in celebration of Korda’s record-tying run.
That’s the only win Korda has ever taken the time to celebrate.
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It’s been 12 months since Korda and her crew enjoyed that celebratory dinner in Texas and although it’s a new year and a new season, the team remains unchanged.
Korda has granted me access to those she has deemed the forward-facing members of her team. There are others who make up Korda’s camp, like her parents, as well as additional coaches and trainers, but they provide support behind the scenes, and that’s where Korda prefers they stay.
But that’s Korda. Private. Shy. And a self-described homebody. Those aren’t the words often used for an athlete at the top of their sport, but the success she’s cultivated in recent years, particularly in 2024, has thrust Korda out of her comfort zone and into an uncomfortable spotlight from which she has largely shied away. The “bubble,” as Korda often refers to her tight, inner circle of supporters, has been cloaked in mystery as she doesn’t share many details, if any, about the individuals that have contributed to her success.
So, why is she letting me in?
“I’ve always been a very private person, in every aspect of my life. That’s just kind of the way I grew up,” Korda tells me. “But, it’s nice to show people your appreciation.”
Korda grew up in a household rarely seen in sports. Her father, Petr, won the 1998 Australian Open, a tennis Grand Slam event, and her mother, Regina, represented what was then Czechoslovakia, in tennis at the 1988 Olympic Games. In their sport, it’s commonplace for athletes to have a dozen or more members in their entourage, which includes anyone from coaches to trainers to agents. Serena Williams once had 40 people with her at the U.S. Open and Andy Murray had more than a dozen individuals in tow just before his retirement. Petr was no different, and Nelly marvels to this day that her father continues to go to dinner and spend an entire day socializing with his personal team, 25 years removed from retirement. That was the model that Nelly grew up observing and later emulated when it came time to formulate her own support staff.
“It’s very tight, close, compared to maybe some other teams that I see in the golf world, but in tennis you have a little bit of a bigger team and everyone’s very tightknit,” Korda says. “And that’s what I love, because this life is really hard, and it gets really lonely, and I know that I have my best friends, too.”
Korda’s support system has evolved into her social circle, too. In 2023, when her sister, Jessica, stepped away from competing on the LPGA Tour (injury and maternity leave), it left a void for Nelly, who had relied on her sister as her go-to dinner companion on the road. That’s when Nelly says she began to rely more heavily on her team as a social outlet and started inviting them to more dinners and offering up extra bedrooms in her rental houses to her caddie’s growing family, to have some companionship.
“I always had [Jessica] as my safe space and then she left and I was like, well, what do I do now?” Korda says, which led her to foster greater friendships with her team. “That’s when we all grew very close.”
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A silver, metal fence separates the manicured grounds, imported trees, and exotic wildlife of Shadow Creek Golf Course from the outer world, where rows of gray, windowless warehouses border the neighboring street. A 6-foot-high berm topped with lush green trees and dense bushes creates a veil of privacy that makes it impossible to see what lies beyond. Just a…
