Kim was born in Seoul, South Korea and is the son of a professional golfer, Kim Chang-ik, who played on the Buy.com Tour before becoming a teaching professional.[2][3] As a result, Kim was based in Australia, the Philippines and later Thailand for a number of years.[4] In 2018 he won the Philippine Amateur Open Championship and the W Express RVF Cup Amateur Championship.[4]
Professional career
Kim turned professional in May 2018, playing on the Philippine Golf Tour.[4] In 2019 he initially played mostly on the Asian Development Tour. In March he had two fourth-place finishes in Malaysia and then two runner-up finishes in Thailand before winning his first event, the PGM ADT Championship, in Malaysia in late June, six strokes ahead of the field. He won the Ciputra Golfpreneur Tournament in Indonesia in August, after a playoff, and the Raya Pakistan Open by nine shots in October. His third win gave him automatic promotion to the Asian Tour for the rest of 2019.[4] In November, he won the Panasonic Open India, becoming, at 17 years and 149 days, the second youngest professional to win on the Asian Tour.[4] The event was reduced to 54 holes because of smog.
In early 2020, he finished fourth in the SMBC Singapore Open. The event was part of the Open Qualifying Series and his high finish gave him an entry into the 2020 Open Championship, his first major championship.
Kim won the 2022 Singapore International, beating Rattanon Wannasrichan in a playoff. The following week he recorded a runner-up finish at the SMBC Singapore Open, seeing him finish as the leading money winner of the 2020–21–22 Asian Tour season.[5] In July, Kim finished solo-third at the Genesis Scottish Open, a co-sanctioned event between the PGA Tour and the European Tour;[6] he was one of three players who had earned entry to the tournament through the Korea Professional Golfers' Association (KPGA). With a T47 finish at the 2022 Open Championship, Kim became eligible for Special Temporary Membership on the PGA Tour for the remainder of the 2021–22 season.[7] He earned his PGA Tour card for the 2022–23 season with a 7th place finish at the Rocket Mortgage Classic.[8] The following week, he shot a final-round 61 to win the Wyndham Championship and gain entry into the 2022 FedEx Cup Playoffs. At the Wyndham Championship, he began the tournament with a quadruple-bogey 8 and finished it with a 9-under 61 for a five-shot victory.[9]
Kim qualified for the International team at the 2022 Presidents Cup; he won two and lost three of the five matches he played, and was hailed by the media as one of the stars of the event due to his entertaining play.[10]
In October 2023, Kim won the Shriners Children's Open for the second consecutive time, joining Byron Nelson as the only golfers to have won the same PGA Tour event twice in the same season.[12]
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South Korea
