The AIG Women’s Open, the final major in the 2022 global golf calendar, will welcome the world’s best women golfers to Muirfield from 4-7 August where a cast of past and potential champions will grace the fairways.
Anna Nordqvist, the defending champion, is one of the most successful players of her generation with 13 professional victories, her most recent coming on the Ladies European Tour this month. Nordqvist has also notably chalked up three major wins and in the Solheim Cup is one of Europe’s leading points-scorers of all time.
The Swede’s amateur career was just as successful and alongside England’s Georgia Hall is one of only two golfers to have won the R&A Girls’ Amateur Championship, Women’s Amateur Championship and AIG Women’s Open.
Reflecting on her victory last year, Nordqvist said, “As a European, the AIG Women’s Open is a major that means a lot to me. It was also an extremely special win because it was so close to where my friends and family live, so I felt very much at home. The support I had from the crowd was unbelievable and I hope it is just as warm this year at Muirfield when I try to defend my title.”
Nordqvist is one of 11 past champions in the AIG Women’s Open field at Muirfield, including:
- 2021 – Anna Nordqvist (SWE, Age: 35, WWGR: 22)
- 2020 – Sophia Popov (GER, 29, 81)
- 2019 – Hinako Shibuno (JPN, 23, 40)
- 2018 – Georgia Hall (ENG, 26, 28)
- 2017 – In-Kyung Kim (KOR, 34, 273)
- 2016 – Ariya Jutanugarn (THA, 26, 48)
- 2015 – Inbee Park (KOR, 34, 13)
- 2014 – Mo Martin (USA, 39, 459)
- 2013 – Stacy Lewis (USA, 37, 75)
- 2009 – Catriona Matthew (SCO, 52, 557)
- 1986 – Laura Davies (ENG, 58, 524)
These champions have provided inspiration to generations of female golfers including the prodigious talent that now tops the Women’s World Golf Rankings. Of the 18 players from the top 20 who are teeing up at Muirfield, 14 are already major champions.
One player seeking their first major victory at the AIG Women’s Open is Thailand’s Atthaya Thitikul, who was the low-amateur at the championship in 2018 and 2019.
The 19-year-old’s rise through the professional rankings continues an exemplary amateur career which saw Thitikul make headlines in 2017 as the youngest player to win a professional golf tournament aged 14 years, four months and 19 days. She subsequently also reached world number one in the World Amateur Golf Rankings®.
Thitikul credits her compatriots, the Jutanugarn sisters, Moriya and Ariya – the…
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