Reigning US Women's Open champion Chun In-Gee of South Korea, who defends her crown starting on Thursday, and Thailand's Ariya Jutanugarn cherished the chance to compete for their homelands in women's golf's return to the Olympic sporting lineup after being contested only in 1900.
"I can't wait for Olympics because it's going to be my first tournament play to represent Thailand," world number seven Ariya said. "I really want to play that tournament because I can represent Thailand and I'm really excited about that."
Several top men's players have withdrawn from Rio Olympic golf over Zika concerns, including world No 1 Jason Day of Australia, fourth-ranked Rory McIlroy, Ireland's Shane Lowry and Japan's Hideki Matsuyama.
South Africa's 37th-ranked Lee-Anne Pace is the only top women's player to have said she will not compete in Rio.
Teams will be chosen based on next Monday's world rankings and Chun, ranked sixth, is third among South Koreans behind world number three Park In-Bee and fifth-ranked Kim Sei-Young.
Park is questionable for the event with a thumb injury but the depth of Korean talent is such that three other players are ninth to 11th in the rankings -- Amy Yang, Jang Ha-Na and Ryu So-Yeon -- and have a chance to move higher.
Chun will be difficult to overtake for one of the four Rio berths on offer for South Korea, twice what most nations will have because so many Koreans are in the world top 15.
