ONE OF golfers most compelling events celebrates its 70th anniversary next Tuesday. On June 3rd, 1927, at Worcester GC in Massachusetts, teams representing the US and Britain and under the captaincy of Waiter Hagen and Ted Ray, launched the Ryder Cup into what was to become a huge, biennial showpiece.
The Americans won the inaugural match by 9 1/2 to 2 1/2 and things remained pretty much that way until the advent of a European side in 1979. Nor did things change much at Worcester over the years. For the 1927 matches, the course measured 6,274 yards off the back tees and it's a relatively modest 6,422 yards today.
The Ryder Cup continues to be a very special event to all of us," said Paul Lazar, the club's general manager. "Newspaper photos and clippings of that time remain in our halls and all of our 400 members, old and new, are very much aware of the event's significance."
Remaining with this fascinating subject, Nick Faldo still considers the stunning wedge to Oak Hill's 18th green to be one of the finest shots he has ever hit, even with another US Masters title to his credit since then. And, as with most things, he gets no argument from his Swedish caddie, Fanny Sunesson.
With splendid timing, her feelings during those crucial moments in September 1995, are recorded in a book published by Mainstream at £15.99. How WE won the Ryder Cup by Norman Dabell, is an absolutely charming - and unashamedly biased account of the caddies' immense contribution to the biennial clash with the US.
They're all there: Scrgio Gomez, who carried the bag for Jose-Maria Olazabal at Muirfield Village in September 1987, four months before becoming his manager; Guy Tillson, who caddied for Eamonn Darcy; Matthew Byrne, one of four cad dying brothers from Bray who was with Christy O'Connor Jnr in 1989; Stuart Dryden, who was Ronan Rafferty's "man" that year; Rod Wooller who caddied for David Feherty at Kiawah Island in 1991 and Bryan McLauchlan, who was with Philip Walton at Oak Hill.
Fanny recalls: "We then had 93 yards to go, the distance was that precise. I have it as a permanent record in my yardage book, Nick's great shot into the last. It was an F-wedge, the middle-wedge, and he just got the most perfect stroke on it, pitched nicely and ran to about four feet just left of the hole for an uphill putt.
"Curtis (Strange) went a foot past us with his chip. He went first (with Faldo's eyes jammed tightly closed) - and missed. Our putt was left to right, horrible, not the sort of putt you want at that stage in any tournament, but this was the Ryder Cup and this one had to go in.
"We read the line together and I lined him up on the putt from behind, as I'd done a lot that week. Nick had shown fantastic nerve at the end and he rolled it in. The scenes were unbelievable. Seve's holding him and crying like a baby, Nick is too and so's Bernard (Gallacher) - we're all very emotional. It only needs Philip (Walton) to finish it off." Fascinating stuff.
NOW with Tiger Woods on their books, IMG can probably afford to be dismissive of those players who have abandoned them. Either way, Mark McCormack claims: "A tot of players who have left us are over the hill. Greg Norman is over the hill. He's 42 years old. Four years ago he told me he was on the back nine. Now he's on the 17th green - and he didn't birdie it either."
DARREN CLARKE had all sorts of reasons for wanting to capture the Volvo PGA Championship last Monday. As for me - I wanted him to win so that I could justify some terribly clever research I had done with the help of an official at the British Central Statistics Office.
The exercise had to do with prize money. You see at £183,340 from a record prize fund, Clarke's winning cheque would have been the highest ever received by an Irish golfer. Even allowing for inflation? Now that's where it became interesting.
As Irish golf fans of a certain vintage are aware, Christy O'Connor Snr won a world record first prize of £25,000 in the John Player Classic at Hollinwell in 1970. An extremely helpful official from the British CSO informed me that the inflation factor since then has been 745 per cent. So, O'Connor's cheque would equate to £186,250 at today's values.
Interestingly, this is still marginally higher than Clarke would have won. For the record, Ronan Rafferty collected the biggest first prize by an Irish golfer with a cheque for £123,000 from the Palm Meadows Cup in Australia in 1992. All of which will simply confirm your assessment of this column as a haven of useless information.
AMERICAN visitor Dan Hourican experienced rather special Irish hospitality during a recent game at Galway Bay G & CC. It happened on the 17th where he drove into the cross-bunker, designed for that purpose. But the architect, Christy O'Connor Jnr, could hardly have anticipated what was to come next.
Hourican's playing partner, Paraic Monaghan, knocked down his drive at the hole and then proceeded to hit his second into the same bunker. But the ball entered the trap at such speed that it collided with Hourican's ball, whereupon both balls ended on the fairway. A bit of western ball-hopping, you might say.
WITH the best will in the world, I find it difficult to take a serious view of Training a Tiger - the official book on how to be the best, by Earl Woods. Published by Hodder and Stoughton at £14.99, it purports to be an instructional book based on the way Earl Woods taught his prodigious son.
Example: "He didn't like the idea that every shot should start from behind the ball, so we had a big discussion about it. Finally I asked him, `Doesn't every shot start with a targets' He answered in the affirmative. I said: `What better way to determine your target than to stand behind your ball and look at it?'
"`Daddy, you know that's right,' said my three-year-old. `That's a good idea.' So we implemented the preshot routine. Then I showed him how he should mentally go over all the necessary conditions that would affect his shot. I don't think a normal three-year-old could have comprehended what I was trying to teach him, but Tiger was not a normal child of three."
A child of three! As his fellow Americans might say, give us a break Earl. I have no doubt that Tiger was an extraordinarily gifted child, but this sort of stuff makes Mozart appear positively backward. And there's more. Lots more.
In a foreword to the book, Tiger writes: "So much has been written about my development as a golfer that sometimes even I have a difficult time distinguishing between fact and fiction." Just so.
JOHN DALY, who returned to competitive action in this week's Memorial Tournament, is back without a main sponsor. Wilson, who signed a $12.9 million deal with the so-called Wild Thing when he won the 1991 USPGA Championship, have dropped him.
IN BRIEF: Guardian Life arc sponsoring the annual Father and Son Open Foursomes at Castle GC on July 5th to 12th .... Special Olympics Ireland will stage its inaugural national golf competition at Elmgreen Golf Centre on June 9th .... Muskerry GC are tomorrow celebrating the opening of their new clubhouse . .. . Delgany GC are staging what they describe as a unique hospitality opportunity, with their "Watch & Play" venture during the Murphy's Irish Open at nearby Druids Glen .... Cumann Gailf Chloich Cheann Fhaola in Co Donegal will be officially opened today by GUI President, Peter O'Hara .... Larry Behan, who captured the Norwich Union McCrea Cup at Dun Laoghaire recently, is a former captain of Greystones GC
The Gardner Merchant/Gerry Kelly Charity Classic will be at Hermitage on June 9th Chris Kane tells me that the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants and Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators will have their annual golf outing at St Margaret's on June 9th. Further information from (01) 6024227 .. .. Cavan GAA Golf Classic is at Slieve Russell on July 18th. Further information from (049) 61888.
TEASER: Posts of a boundary fence have been set in concrete bases, 14 inches in diameter. Are the parts of the bases within the boundary of the course obstructions?
ANSWER: No. Such a base is part of the fence and thus no part of it is an obstruction. If such bases are at or below ground level, the boundary line is the inside points of the fence posts at ground level. If they are above ground level, the committee should clarify the location of the boundary line.
