“It was a very meaningful season where I learned a lot from moments when the play didn’t go well.”
Go Gun-taek (24, Daebo Engineering & Construction), who hit a career high in his fourth year of debut on the Korea Professional Golf (KPGA) Tour, said this while looking back on the 2023 season. This year, he set a record of 3 wins in a season for the first time in 5 years since Park Sang-hyun (40, Dong-A Pharmaceutical) in 2018, and for the first time in 16 years for a player in his 20s. He postponed his military service due to his refusal to join the military, and as the saying goes, ‘rowing while the water is rising,’ he is spending a winter that is hotter than ever.
Go Gun-taek is participating in the LIV Golf Promotion held at the Abu Dhabi GC in the United Arab Emirates, which opens on the 8th and runs until the 10th. If you place in the top three in this competition, which is a qualifying school, you will receive a ticket to next year's LIV Golf. Go Gun-taek said, “Because only the top three players are selected, I actually applied to compete to gain experience,” and added, “I plan to learn a lot by meeting foreign players.”
Go Gun-taek opened the door to the first and 부산달리기 second half of this season’s KPGA Tour. He debuted on the regular tour in 2020 and won his first career win at the season opener, DB Non-life Insurance Promi Open in April this year. Then, he added a number of wins at the Honors K and Solarago CC Han Jang Sang Invitational in July, and even won the 39th Shinhan Donghae Open in September, the first tournament of the second half of the year, accumulating 3 wins in 5 months. “I won three games this year, but the fact that I didn’t receive the grand prize means I wasn’t consistent,” said Go Gun-taek, who was disappointed. “I’m still nothing.” “We need to learn more in the future,” he emphasized. This year's Genesis Grand Prize (MVP) was won by Ham Jeong-woo (29, Hana Financial Group), and Go Gun-taek was the winner of the most wins.
Go Gun-taek, who had not won in 48 competitions until last year, benefited greatly from improving his distance and ability to use various pitches. The result led to three championship trophies. This year, he recorded an average driver shot distance of 293 yards (48th) on the more info KPGA Tour. This is an increase of about 15 yards compared to last year, and this year is the first time that he has ranked in the top 50 in the long distance category since his debut. He also easily threw the desired pitches, such as draws and fades. He said, “During last winter, I practiced a lot of pitches while improving my backswing and grip. “I used to hit the draw, but I made a lot of misses,” he said. “This year, it became easier to target the hole by hitting both the draw and the fade. “The increased distance of over 10m was also a big help,” he explained.
Go Gun-taek was originally planning to enlist in the military in December after finishing this season. He couldn't help but be worried about the 'military gap (vacancy due to military service)', which KPGA tour players regard as the biggest risk. However, the road to overseas expansion was opened by winning the Shinhan Donghae Open jointly organized by Korea, Japan, and the Asian Tour. Received a 5-year seed for the KPGA Tour and a 2-year seed for the Japan and Asian Tours. He immediately canceled his application to enlist in the Army Technical Administration Corps, which he had applied for a few days before the opening of this competition. “Now that I am eligible to participate, I want to gain experience in overseas tours. “It will definitely help my golf career,” he said.
Next year is expected to be more challenging than this year for Go Gun-taek, who postponed his military service. Ko Gun-taek, who set his goal of winning 4 wins in the KPGA Tour season and winning overseas tours next year, said, “It was difficult to win 3 times, but the higher the goal, the better, so I will aim for 4 wins in the season.” He added, “I will aim for 4 wins in the season until the KPGA Tour season begins next spring.” “I plan to play in Korea and then tour Japan and Korea in parallel,” he said.