Free spirit Minkyu Kim’s ‘Happy Newborn’

candid and bold The victory that will come someday is good, but I want to be happy tomorrow. About the ‘fresh’ of Minkyu Kim, the leader of Gen Z who will lead men’s golf.

“I should have been the prize money king! Right?” As soon as the interview started, Minkyu Kim smiled and took out his words. “It’s strange that I couldn’t putt in the finals. It must have been a tournament I couldn’t win.” Can you be this honest and cool? He is like a next-generation star representing the Korean Tour.

Kim Min-gyu’s 2022 season is half joy and half regret. He won his first career victory at the Kolon Korea Open in June. He even won the championship prize money of 450 million won and the right to participate in the Open, but he got into a car accident on the way to the tournament in Jeju in August. He hasn’t competed in the competition for over two months.

It seems that joy and regret will be more evident in the 2022 season than anyone else.

I feel like I’ve progressed to the next level since I won my first victory that I had hoped so much for. In the meantime, he only came in second place, so I thought a lot about ‘Am I destined not to win, or am I mentally weak?’ In addition, there have been many ups and downs, but I am satisfied that I have consistently achieved good results for the first time this year. So it’s a pity that I took a break for a long time because of the accident. Rather than being sick, the gap in the individual title competition was gradually narrowing, but I felt bad all along because I couldn’t participate in the tournament.

The first win I had hoped so much for came at the biggest tournament on the Korean Tour.
It would have been nice if it was a different tournament, but it was much better because it was the Korea Open. I really didn’t know I was going to win. The difference in strokes was quite large, and I was not trying to win the final round, but I wanted to get a ticket to the Open. I am proud of winning the Korean Open.

During the Korea Open, you received attention for your aggressive and bold play. 
Absolutely not. At the Woori Finance Championship, I was in the lead ahead of the final round, but I couldn’t sleep well. You woke up too early in the morning At that time, his close junior Song Min-hyeok served as caddy, and he said, ‘Hyung, can you?’ I was so nervous that I just had to keep saying this. In the end, I didn’t win then, and I was nervous at the Korea Open, but I wasn’t anxious. I don’t know why. He definitely seems to have the energy to win. Even thinking about it now, I wonder how he could have been so grave.

■ ESFP Free-spirited entertainer The

MZ generation, full of personality, understands people through the MBTI personality type test. Kim Minkyu’s MBTI is ‘a free-spirited entertainer’ ESFP. They are optimistic, playful, and value relationships with others. 

When asked what kind of person he would like to introduce himself, he said, “I’m a government servant. I’m a bit of a nice nerd,” and he chuckled. “What kind of actions did you do?

A free-spirited entertainer. Do you agree?
It seem to be like that. When golf doesn’t go well, I practice hard and dig in, but I hate being stuck in a rut. When I’m good, I don’t practice well. I really want to improvise, but I don’t really do it because it’s annoying. A kind, hard-working, sincere idiot? (Laughter)

How do golfers relieve stress in their early 20s? 
same. I meet friends, watch movies, and go to karaoke. I often meet with my fellow players. During the competition, we ate together, played around and joked around. All Korean Tour players are friendly. Same with older brothers.

If you look at the competition site or on social media, you get along well with your peers. 
(Bae) Yongjun hyung, (Lee) Jaekyung hyung All CJ players are close. In the tournament Yongjun hyung won, he said, ‘I want to win like Mingyu’, and he sent the article and said, “Did you talk about me, honey?” and joked Then play (laughs).

no. Even though there are a lot of older hyungs on the Korean tour, it’s not about discipline, it’s a very comfortable atmosphere. Is it because they are all these days? These days, I am close with (Jeong) Hanmil hyung. There is a 10 year age difference between Hanmil hyung and when I joke around with ‘Hanmil~’, Hanmil hyung laughs while swearing at me and accepts it. I have a beer with the hyungs after the tournament, and after the season, I play futsal, and things like that are fun.

It seems that the male players are tight. 
MZ generation players are secretly fun, good at sports, and good at golf. Just looking at it, the atmosphere is really good. I don’t know how others see it, but it’s really funny between us. A little kid’s picnic atmosphere? Even while practicing, ‘Hey, why is the backswing shaped like that?’ play while It’s not that I’m joking around badly. But when you’re focused, you just do it.

■ A competition that you went out ‘chabak’ 

When did you start playing golf? 
When his father was seven years old, he told him to become a golf player. ‘Would you like to play golf? Try it and decide if it’s fun or not’, he said that you should be a golf player from the beginning.

I don’t think it would have been easy for my father to suddenly and resolutely tell me to become a golfer. 
At the time, he was a travel agency, but there were many products related to golf in Jeju Island. I fell in love with golf for a reason, but there are many good players in Jeju Island, and there are people around my father who raised their children to be players, so I don’t think it was difficult. He only thought that he had to grow into a great player.

Did you learn golf from your father? 
At first it was. I was terribly upset. He was completely powerless now. He doesn’t touch what I’m doing at all, but he was really strict when I was younger. I don’t remember how I practiced with my dad, but rather than teaching me golf, my dad watched and supported me so that I could do well. I met Pro Lee Kyung-hoon when I was in the 5th grade of elementary school and have been learning until now.

I didn’t start playing golf for fun, but I must have rebelled against my father once, saying I didn’t want to play it. 
Golf wasn’t easy when I was younger. Even at a young age, he knew he was playing golf the hard way. So I thought, ‘I have nothing to do without this’. It wasn’t ‘I want to’, it was ‘I should’. There was no bird to feel that I didn’t want to do it.

When was the hardest? 
Around the 6th grade of elementary school to the 1st or 2nd grade of middle school. That was the hardest time. Looking at my friends who were my age then, I was really young. I thought about what they were going to do, because at that time I knew that the family situation was difficult.

Even though it was a difficult time, how did you manage to play on the Euro Pro Tour (DP World Tour Part 3) when you were in high school? 
I was playing for the national team, but my father suddenly asked me to go to Europe. He also had a hard life in Europe. There were times when I couldn’t find a hotel and slept in the car. Washing is done in the locker room. At that time, the car was like a van, but if you recline all the back seats and put a thin mattress on it, it’s still flat, so it’s good to sleep.

It’s something I laugh about now, but it seems like I really went through a lot with my father. 
hit. Still, he grew up bright without a spot. My dad told me not to mind and somehow, he allowed me to compete in the competition, even by borrowing money. But there’s no way the son right next to him doesn’t know. So when I think of his dad, I still cry.

What kind of person is Kim Min-kyu’s father? 
He is usually kind and flexible. First, ‘Meet a girlfriend. He even jokes that a man is not popular with a woman the most. However, he is very strict when it comes to golf. He has never been told that he was good since he was young. He says that whatever I do, I should do it. He wants to hear a word that he did well.

■ To live happily ‘newly born’

I seem to have lived really hard ever since I was little. Do you still have obsessive thoughts?
Even now, practicing is stuck in my body. I think I have to do well in order to maintain and move forward with what I have achieved so far. If I stop for a while, I feel like I can get back to normal, so I practice every day.

Isn’t it hard to live a busy life after practicing and participating in competitions? 
It’s fun to play golf with a sense of tension regardless of whether you’ve done well or not in a tournament. Also, the process of trying, whether it works well or not, is fun. It’s really stressful, but also annoying and fun. Even now, if the ball doesn’t hit me, I practice a lot. Seeing me engrossed in practice even though I’m pissed off is something else fun. If you practice persistently, you will feel proud of something.

What kind of golf player do you want to be? 
I want to be a player who wins once a year. If you get used to comfortable things, you will become more relaxed, so shouldn’t you try overseas to become bigger?

Do you have any goals, such as holding a tournament with your name on it like the respected professional Choi Kyung-ju, or establishing a foundation for juniors?  토토사이트
I need to make a plan for that, but I haven’t had one yet. Is it because of his personality? I live by looking only one inch ahead. I’m not chasing money, but I want to earn a lot of money and be happy right away. Also, I want to become a human pro who takes good care of the people around me. I don’t like to hear that I’ve changed because I’m doing well. Even while we are still competing for the title, I want to play around with the hyungs. In fact, even if I don’t win, I pass it off as ‘this ranking is okay too’. 

How will you spend next season? 
I plan to participate in the Asian Tour a lot. Since (Kim) Joo-hyung entered the PGA Tour after playing on the Asian Tour, I am trying to create an opportunity to move on to the PGA Tour after playing on the Asian Tour. It seems like a realistic way to aim for an overseas tour.