LPGA major winner out of U.S. Women's Open with nagging injury

With four wins, including two majors, Lilia Vu enjoyed a remarkable 2023 LPGA season. The current campaign has been nothing but one disappointment after another.

The World No. 2 has been dealing with back issues that have allowed her only seven starts, and Vu will miss another one when the 79th U.S. Women’s Open is played next week at Lancaster (Pa.) Country Club. Vu is no longer listed in the field and has been replaced by 22-year-old Yealimi Noh.

This will be the second straight major Vu has missed after she withdrew before trying to defend her title at the Chevron Championship in April. She last played in the Ford Championship in late March and has missed five potential starts since then.

In her breakout season of 2023, the 26-year-old Californian captured her first major title in the Chevron and five months later shot 67-67 on the weekend to win the AIG Women’s Open at Walton Heath. She had opened the campaign with a victory in Thailand and bookended that with a fourth title at The Annika in November.

Vu spent 28 weeks at the top of the Rolex Women’s World Rankings and currently sits at No. 2 behind Nelly Korda.

Noh, ranked 146th in the world, shot 69-73 in qualifying at Rainier Golf and Country Club in Seattle, Wash., to be the second alternate. The first alternate was Taiwan’s Ssu Chia Cheng, and as reported by Golfweek, the USGA determined after the qualifiers that the Seattle field was strong enough to reward a fourth qualifying spot.