Armitstead wants to cut her pain in the hills
Anna Nordqvist says she wants to avoid the pain of injury again this year after going to the Games in the Winter Olympics at age 30.
The Swede, who returned to action earlier this year after twice having wrist surgery in 2017, won the China Open.
Nordqvist, 30, and Wie Sinchen have been drawn together for the first round of the tournament in Saudi Arabia.
She tweeted that “with the Olympics in mind” she hoped to avoid aggravating her wrist.
While playing in the China Open, Nordqvist won by a shot from Thailand’s Ariya Jutanugarn with a 70-70 final round.
“In the past, the Olympics were not important to me,” said Nordqvist. “I went to the Olympics with the idea of being a better player and winning tournaments. That’s it.
“This time I have the mindset of being a better player, then hopefully I’ll be able to go there and do that.”
The PGA Tour is also starting a qualifying school, which runs through to 3 November.
Last year, when it was on the PGA Tour schedule, it was cut short as the men’s US PGA Tour took a year off to commemorate the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Nordqvist added: “Of course you want to play. You have no other choice.
“You want to make it as nice as possible and I think it’s important for all of us. For women, it’s important to play. For me, it’s one of the most exciting weeks of the year.
“If there was going to be a tournament in the month of October that would have been great.”
Four weeks after the US PGA Championships, the Professional Golfers’ Association Championship will be held, and then Sweden will play in the Presidents Cup on 2 and 3 October before returning to the Solheim Cup in August.
The eight-nation event is named after the women’s version of the Ryder Cup and follows in the footsteps of the reverse format of the men’s event.
The event first began in 1994 at Ebbw Vale in Wales, which was the scene of a memorable five-set shootout between US and European teams.
The European team won by 20 shots, a similar margin to the 15-1 margin the Ryder Cup produced a week later in Louisville, Kentucky.
The International team was born after Europe prevailed by 14 points to 11 in the 1999 event in Melbourne.
The first winner in Saudi Arabia will earn a spot in the six-woman field next year, after Donald Trump said the event had been expanded to allow Saudi Arabia as part of a joint bid with Ireland.
The women’s event has expanded from 36 to 72 holes and the men’s event will feature 64 holes.
Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud signed a decree authorizing the Ritz Carlton hotel in Riyadh to become the host hotel.
The event will be played at the Jeddah Golf Club, which was where the British royal family was held during the 1919-1920 Intifada and now has a two-hole women’s course.