‘I was 4 under when I woke up’

A team loaded with former European Ryder Cup stars wasn’t going to take long to hit its stride in the Skechers World Champions Cup — a PGA Tour Champions event that pits squads of the best 50-and-older players from the U.S., Europe and the rest of the world — and in the tournament’s second playing, the Europeans did just that. On a Sunday when torrential rain and gusting winds made Feather Sound Country Club, on Florida’s west coast, look, at times, like a scene from “Deadliest Catch,” the Europeans unleashed fury of their own.

The World Champions Cup is a three-day, six-session contest, featuring two days of six-ball play and Scotch Sixsomes (a modified version of alternate shot) followed by two sessions of 9-hole singles matches on the third and final day. After the first two days, the Europeans’ six-player side held a narrow 1.5-point lead over the Americans and 3-point advantage over the Internationals — which took us to Sunday, which figured to be a tense back-and-forth battle with the overall points race so close.

But Europe, as it so often does in international team play, had other plans, needing all of about a half-dozen holes in the first set of singles matches to rob the finale of any suspense.

In the first match out — the players competed in groups of three, with one representative from each side — Colin Montgomerie birdied three of the first five holes; in the ensuing match came Europe’s playing-captain, Darren Clarke, who birdied four of the first five, a feat matched by the European in the day’s third match, Thomas Bjorn. The cigar-chomping Spaniard, Miguel Ángel Jiménez, also came out hot, in match 4, birdieing three of the first five before stumbling home to finish at two over. But his messy finish was picked up by Alex Cejka, who, fighting a bad back, played the first six holes in five under, which is where he finished. In the final match was Bernhard Langer, who could manage only two birdies and finished two over — but the damage already had been done. When the dust (more like deluge) had settled, Europe had a lead of 17 on the Internationals and 19 on the U.S.

Game over? Not officially, but Europe had effectively made the afternoon nine a mere formality.  

Bjorn, 54, a Dane who played on three winning European Ryder Cup teams and captained another, best summed up his squad’s dominance.

“I was four under par when I woke up,” he said. “That’s always a nice thing. Then you’re in that groove.”

Europe’s groove continued in the second wave of singles matches, thanks in part to another Dane, Soren Kjeldesen, one of Clarke’s two assistant captains who had to pinch hit for Cejka, on account of Cejka’s balky back. Kjeldesen — given all of about a half-hour’s notice that his services would be required — opened with five straight birdies and added one more before doubling the 9th to finish at four under. How do you top that start? With four straight birdies and an eagle, which is how Langer, 68 years young and playing in the day’s final match, came out of the gates en route to his five-under round. In the end, Europe earned 230 points, 16.5 more than the Mike Weir-captained Internationals and 25.5 better than the U.S.

“We actually played some pretty darn good golf,” said U.S. playing-captain Jim Furyk. Just not even close to good enough to keep up with the blistering pace of the Europeans. “Man, they just made a ton of birdies and went out there and won the golf tournament,” Furyk added.

The brightest spot on a gloomy day for the Americans was the one U.S. player who might have had even regular golf-watchers dialing up Wikipedia: Jason Caron. That’s no disrespect to Caron — just an acknowledgment of the fact that as recently as two years ago he spent most of his time focused on his head professional duties at Mill River Club in Oyster Bay, N.Y. Then, in 2024, he played his way on to the PGA Tour Champions, where this season he finished 21st in the points race. His stout year earned him an unlikely place in the World Champions Cup, where after a four-birdie performance in his second singles match, he became the U.S.’s top point-earner for the week, ahead of the likes of Stewart Cink, Steve Stricker and Justin Leonard. “What can I take away?” Caron said afterward. “I guess for me personally it would be like, listen, I can play with all these guys out here.”

Mother Nature has not been kind to the World Champions Cup. After the event’s 2023 debut at The Concession Golf Club in Bradenton, Fla., which the Americans won in a come-from-behind thriller on the final hole, the 2024 edition was nixed when a pair of hurricanes wreaked havoc on the region. This year’s event began under sunny skies but culminated on a day so foul that, for stretches, the course looked borderline unplayable. After Europe had clinched the winning point and the final couple of groups made their way down the 9th hole, the champions were huddled under umbrellas, with blue-and-white striped towels around their necks, looking more chilled than cheerful.     

The winner’s press conference, in the comfort of the Feather Sound clubhouse, was another story, though. Smiles. Jokes. Laughs. And even a little good-natured ribbing.

“It takes a team to win this,” Montgomerie said. “It takes all six or seven of us, whoever substituted in, and it takes all seven of us to score 230 points, which I believe is, what, 16 more than the last winning team? I won’t mention their name…U.S.A.”

Monty wasn’t done.

“That’s a big difference,” he continued. “That was a huge difference. It was a huge team effort from word go this week, and I’m very proud to be on this team. As I said at the start of the week, very proud to pull on a European shirt and represent Europe the way that we have a number of times. Good to emulate what the [European] Ryder Cup [team] has achieved this year in winning on American soil. I would say that this team deserves more credit than they do really. I think it was a bigger win. Never mind Luke Donald. We’ll go Darren Clarke two more years.”

Monty’s teammates howled.

This is Team Europe — at any level of the game. Loose but tight-knit. Fun-loving but focused. Joke-crackers but ass-kickers. And always with an appreciation for the ties that bond them.   

“Twenty-eight years ago, most of us played on the same Ryder Cup team,” said Jesper Parnevik, Clarke’s second vice captain. “Miguel was the vice captain. I was a player. This year, Miguel is on the team, and I’m the vice captain. No other sport would that ever happen except for golf. I think it’s amazing just to have that history behind us.”

Those threads to the past are, at its core, the beauty of this event, which its organizers say they have visions of sustaining for the next 100 years and beyond, with the hopes of taking it overseas sooner than later. (Sites in Ireland and the Bahamas have expressed interest in hosting, a source close to the event told me.)  

“I think, as the word spreads about this tournament and what it is, how exciting it is and how great it is and good golf, there will be people traveling from all over the places to come and watch,” Langer said. “I met a gentleman today, said he flew all the way from Germany just to watch me or us play, just for the week.”

“Maybe it was me,” Cejka quipped.

“It was you, too,” Langer continued. “Anyways, it takes a while. The Ryder Cup wasn’t the Ryder Cup when it started. It took a few years to take off. I believe this can have the same effect.”