IN MY VIEW

After the disappointment of losing The Curtis Cup, British and European golf has enjoyed a wonderful Summer and Autumn, culminating in Europe’s recent trouncing of the Americans in The Ryder Cup.

In August, England’s Karen Stupples beat the best women golfers in the world to claim this year’s Weetabix British Women’s Open, which is also the final “major” of the year.

Karen’s victory at Sunningdale created a universal feeling of delight amongst all the fans and spectators who went to Sunningdale, or watched on television. Firstly, Karen was the first British winner of The Weetabix since Penny Grice-Whittaker in 1991, but mainly because of the rags to riches story behind her win. When Karen turned professional in 1999, she had to sell virtually everything she owned to finance her qualifying campaign. Steady progress since then resulted in her first LPGA victory earlier this year when she won the Welch's/Fry's Championship in Tucson, Arizona.
That win went virtually unnoticed by the British public, but was the result of a lot of hard work, and a growing self belief that she was ready to win, having played well to finish runner-up to Annika Sorenstam in Australia at the start of the year.

Karen’s victory was the stuff that dreams are made of, as indeed she said at the prizegiving. Talking of dreams, Karen started the final round two shots behind the leaders, but following a spectacular eagle, albatross start to her final round, never looked back. Not only did Karen’s win put her name and face firmly in the minds of the golfing public, but it almost gauranteed her a place in next year’s Solheim Cup Team to face the Americans at Crooked Stick, Indiana. She will be a great Team member and strengthen the European Team.

Another Karen, this time Karine Icher, the 25 year old French woman won the Catalonia Masters with a record breaking score of seventeen under par, shooting rounds of 62,64,62. What a great way to complete the season and get herself back into Solheim Cup reckoning! Since having a fantastic rookie season in 2001, and making the European Solheim Cup Team the following year, Karine has struggled, but looks set to get back to the very top of the European Tour!

Even despite taking six weeks away from competition after playing in the Weetabix, Annika Sorenstam continues to dominate in America and is seemingly unassailable at the top of the LPGA money list and as the world number one female player. In men’s golf, Vijay Singh has won nine times in 2004, and recently replaced Tiger Woods as the world number one, and last week after victory in the American Express World Championship at Mount Juliet in Ireland, Ernie Els replaced Tiger as the world number two!

With only a few regular tour events left on the 2004 schedules, there are all the end of season limited field events for the top players still to play in. Indeed, I am looking forward to once again being a studio guest at SKY Tv when they show all four days of the ADT Tournament Player’s Championship live from Wet Palm Beach, Florida.

Without doubt the biggest and most eagerly awaited golfing event of the year was the Ryder Cup played on the Oakland Hills golf course in Michigan. Everyone will know the result, which was the most emphatic win for Europe in the history of the contest, but the manor in which the Europeans won and how they conducted themselves was wonderful to watch. With Colin Montgomerie being the person to hole the winning putt, the scriptwriters couldn’t have done better if they’d planned it! Bernhard Langer was a wonderful Captain, who will be a hard act to follow. In fact even before a single shot was hit in the contest, Europeans will have felt that we were leading after the opening ceremony! The words, comments and behaviour of Langer in contrast to Hal Sutton’s performance was like compering Arsenal with Millwall! I have experienced many opening ceremonies at The Ryder Cup, Solheim Cup and Curtis Cups, but this year’s at The Ryder Cup was the cheesiest and most farcical of them all. How the Europeans managed to sit through it with straight faces and in good grace I will never know! The bottom line of all these international encounters is always the golf, and in that department Europe were outstanding, and from the moment that Colin Montgomerie holed his birdie putt to put he and Padraig Harrington one up against America’s top pairing of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson, the contest was never in doubt. Congratulations to Europe on a truly stunning performance!
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