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Warbug Cup how Ryder
Cup should be
The first Warburg Cup, by everyone's account, was golf the way the Ryder Cup
ought to be.
Whether next year's competition at The Belfry is the friendly, joke-filled
weekend 24 of golf's greatest enjoyed at The Ocean Course is anybody's guess.
``It's good to get back with old friends and spend a couple of days with them,''
said Curtis Strange, the U.S. Ryder Cup captain for the 2002 event and part of
the winning American team at the Warburg. ``But the Ryder Cup is a different animal.
It's taken very differently and it has a long, long history behind it.''
And one that has turned ugly at times.
Everyone remembers the wild scene of players and other Americans rushing the
17th green at The Country Club two years ago when Justin Leonard hit a 45-foot
putt. It was an image Warburg Cup captains Arnold Palmer of the United States
and Gary Player of the World team hoped to end through example.
``I know that Arnold and I and a lot of the guys in this room are not used
to seeing things like that,'' Player said. ``To hear, 'This is a war,' and 'This
guy doesn't like this guy.' There's not time in life to say you don't like anybody.''
The golf hostilities may have started here at this seaside course built by
master architect Pete Dye just for the Ryder Cup. It was called ``The War at the
Shore'' and took its toll on all the competitors. Mark Calcavecchia cried on the
sand dunes after losing a 4-up lead with four holes to play against Colin Montgomerie.
Bernhard Langer and Hale Irwin limped to the end of the last singles match before
Langer's missed 5-footer for par on No. 18 gave the cup to the United States --
and gave him a lasting moment of Ryder anguish.
Calcavecchia, Langer and Irwin all returned this week and felt the looser,
relaxed atmosphere for themselves at the Ryder Cup-style event for players 40
and older.
Players shared locker rooms and dining areas. They chatted on fairways. They
talked with fans. Irwin spent part of Friday night at a karaoke outing, he and
two others belting out an off-key rendition of ``Mustang Sally.''
``It would be nice if it was as fun as this,'' said Calcavecchia, who's on
the American Ryder Cup team next year. ``But it's just a little bigger deal, quite
honestly.''
Sam Torrance, the European Ryder Cup captain, said he and Strange agreed to
do what they could to ensure a respectful competition before the terrorist attacks
postponed things for a year.
``We've all been friends for a while,'' Torrance said. ``We didn't think things
would get out of hand this time.''
For nearly 60 years, since Samuel Ryder donated a cup to celebrate gentlemanly
competition between the United States and Britain, the matches were played in
a relative obscurity. It didn't help that the Americans dominated, winning 22
of the first 25 Ryder Cups.
But when golf boomed throughout the world and an expanded European team won
cups in 1985 and 1987, interest and intensity in the tournament picked up.
``I don't think it was the players who got into the war,'' Dye said. He thought
galleries wanting to cheer loudly for the home team raised the Ryder fire.
``One thing about it, you've got to remember, the Ryder Cup 10 or 12 years
was a nonentity,'' Dye said. ``It has escalated so quickly, which is great for
the game of golf.''
Langer agrees.
Crowds ``can stir up a bit of trouble themselves,'' said Langer, part of Torrance's
European team next September. ``You don't ever hear cheers like you do in the
Ryder Cup.''
Strange expects a calmer, more respectful crowd at The Belfry because of what
the world saw as one on Sept. 11.
``You never know a year removed what it's going to be like,'' Strange said.
``We've never done this before. We never had a tragedy like this in our lives
or in the world. I expect it to carry over.''
Langer felt the collective grief should bring all fans together next year.
``I would guess that maybe even the crowd would be a little more in control,''
he said.
Palmer, who led the United States to the first Warburg win, was glad Strange
and Torrance were here to see the camaraderie and fellowship.
``I saw them swallowing hard because they saw something that they both enjoyed,''
Palmer said. ``And I'm sure that they are both hoping and praying that the Ryder
Cup will be conducted in the same fashion.''
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