Scotland's Janice Moodie has been forced to pull out of the women's major, the McDonald's LPGA Championship at Bulle Rock in Maryland, because of an ankle injury.

"I missed a step going down into the basement last week," explained the Florida-based Scot. "I heard a pop and it turned out that I had sprained my ankle.

"I've just started to walk on it again, but it is still not great on uneven ground so there is no way I could possibly play this week."

Catriona Matthew, who finished tied tenth last year, and Mhairi McKay are the two Scots in the £1M field. Norway's Suzann Pettersen, the world No.3, is the defending champion.

World No.1 Lorena Ochoa, with six wins already this year, is the favourite and is bidding to make it three majors in a row, and the a second leg of a possible season's Grand Slam of all four of the biggest titles in the women's game.

The Mexican won her first major - the Ricoh Women's British Open - by four shots at St Andrews last August and was a comfortable five stroke winner of the Kraft Nabisco Championship in California in March. In the three years of this Championship taking place at Bulle Rock, she has finished fifth, ninth and sixth.

But the 26-year-old hasn't had the best of preparations. She withdrew from last week's tournament in South Carolina to go home and visit her sick uncle in Mexico, and he died at the weekend.