From 10 Back to History – Haeran Ryu’s Miraculous Comeback at Women’s PGA Championship

Haeran Ryu arrived at Hazeltine National Golf Club as an afterthought — ten shots off the pace after a forgettable opening round, recovering from surgery, ranked twelfth in the world, with a win probability of 0.2 percent. She left as a Major champion, the architect of the greatest first-round deficit comeback in professional golf in 62 years, and the owner of the largest winner’s cheque in women’s golf history. Haeran Ryu’s week at the 2026 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship was not just a sporting achievement. It was a masterclass in quiet, relentless belief.

Chaska, Minnesota: The Roaring of the crowd at Hazeltine’s 18th green on Sunday evening told the full story. Ryu, a 25-year-old from South Korea, survived a wet, windy and wild final round to win the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship — her first career Major — on a day that saw four different leaders and world No. 1 Nelly Korda close to within two shots through ten holes before ultimately fading. A closing two-under-par 70 gave her a 13-under total, two shots clear of fellow South Korean Ina Yoon, who also closed with a 70. The trophy, the cheque, the history — all of it hers.

Ryu is the first golfer — man or woman — to overcome a 10-shot first-round deficit to win a major championship since Carol Mann came from 10 back to win the 1964 Women’s Western Open. Sixty-two years of golf. Thousands of major championships played. Not once, in all that time, had anyone done what Ryu did at Hazeltine this week.

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Rest, Home Cooking, and a Changed Putter

The backstory to this triumph begins not at Hazeltine but in South Korea, six weeks before the tournament started. Ryu was in her first week back on tour after undergoing minor surgery, having returned to South Korea to recover. She missed the previous major — the US Women’s Open — entirely. “It was a little bit sad to miss the US Open but it is OK,” she said after her victory. “I worked hard again and got good rest, and had a good time with my parents and my friends.” She went home, detached from the tour’s relentless grind, and ate her mother’s cooking. That reset, as it turned out, was the foundation of a major championship.

When Ryu arrived at Hazeltine and carded a one-over 73 in the first round — with Ina Yoon lighting up the scorecard with a nine-under 63, the lowest opening round in Women’s PGA Championship history — the tournament felt over for her before it had begun. Her win probability was just 0.2 percent. She made a change that would prove pivotal: switching to a Scotty Cameron putter she had used when finishing second at the LPGA’s Cincinnati stop. “I just thought, ‘This is the comeback tournament. I just want to play on the weekend,'” Ryu said of her mindset after that opening round.

64. 68. 70. The Numbers That Wrote History

What followed over the next three days was a study in precision and patience. Ryu did not win this championship with one great final round. She won it by refusing to let one poor opening round define her week. On Friday she carded a bogey-free 64 — the low round of the day. On Saturday, a 68, again the joint low of the day. She became the first player at this championship to post the lowest round in both the second and third rounds since Mickey Wright in 1966. By the time Sunday arrived, she held a one-shot lead and faced a 3.5-hour weather delay before a single ball was struck.

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The final round was a drama in four acts. Four players held the lead at different points. Yoon bogeyed the par-5 third after a double-bogey, squandering her position. Brooke Henderson, seeking to win the Women’s PGA ten years after her maiden Major at Sahalee, led outright as late as the sixth hole before bogeys crept in. Ryu, meanwhile, weathered every challenge — birdies at the seventh, ninth, tenth and twelfth holes, all from inside fourteen feet, building a two-stroke cushion that proved unassailable. A clutch par save on the 16th, then six straight pars to close. On the 18th green, she holed a one-footer for par and a two-shot victory, laughing and pumping her fist as the crowd erupted.

“It feels like a dream, and I cannot trust it right now. It felt like a dream and that’s why I laughed a lot on the last hole,” Ryu said. “Feels like dreams come true right now because I tried the couple times on the major champion but I don’t get it; today I did it, so I’m so happy right now.”

Korda’s Hall of Fame Wait

The other story of Sunday was the one that did not happen. World No. 1 Nelly Korda arrived at Hazeltine seeking a third consecutive Major — the Chevron Championship in April and the US Women’s Open in June already secured — which would have earned her entry to the LPGA Hall of Fame and placed her alongside Babe Zaharias and Inbee Park as the only women to win three straight majors.

Instead, her putter betrayed her all week. Korda opened Sunday’s final round with a three-putt bogey on the first hole, missing from five feet — the fifth time in twelve attempts on that hole all week. Three birdies in a four-hole stretch brought her to within two shots at the eleventh tee, before a three-putt from 64 feet on the twelfth — her fifth three-putt of the week — dropped her five back and ended her challenge. A closing 73 left her tied for eighth, seven shots behind Ryu. “I was kind of disappointed in the way that I played this week, not that I came up short, really,” Korda said. “I was just thinking about the way that I played, not like the realistic big picture that everyone is talking about.” The Hall of Fame will wait.

A Record Purse for a Record Week

The size of the occasion was matched by the size of the reward. Ryu took home $1.95 million from a record $13 million purse — the largest in women’s golf history, nearly triple what the last Hazeltine winner, Hannah Green in 2019, received. Ryu becomes the sixth different South Korean player to lift the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship since 2015, and the seventh player since 1990 to win at least once in each of her first four seasons on the LPGA Tour. “Next tournament, they will introduce me like, ‘Major champion, Haeran Ryu.’ It is amazing for me,” she said, laughing, still unable to fully believe what she had just accomplished.

From a one-over 73 on a Thursday afternoon in Minnesota, to a champagne shower on the 18th green on Sunday evening. Haeran Ryu did not just win the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship. She rewrote what is possible in a major championship week — and reminded everyone that in golf, until the final putt drops, nobody is ever really out of it.

Final Leaderboard — 2026 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship
Hazeltine National Golf Club, Chaska, Minnesota | June 25–28, 2026

Total Purse: $13,000,000 (record in women’s golf history)
Player of the Tournament: Haeran Ryu — rounds of 73-64-68-70