An Enduring Passion

Book excerpt: The Ryder Cup has defined Sam Torrance's life as a professional golfer. He has played with and against some of the greatest golfers the game has ever known, in the biggest and most high-pressure team event in golf. In An Enduring Passion, Torrance recalls every great moment in the two decades he spent pursuing Ryder Cup glory and looks at how the event has changed since he was trying to qualify for it as a player in the late 1970s. He examines the tactics and techniques of the captains he played under and those he played against, and tells how his huge experience as a player, and his vice captaincy to Mark James in the bear pit of Brookline, shaped the way he conducted his own captaincy at The Belfry in 2002. Everything he had learned about the Ryder Cup went into his leadership during that event, and when he raised the trophy aloft at the end of it all he knew he had learned the lessons well. Today, Sam Torrance is one of the most identifiable faces, and voices, of golf. It is the Ryder Cup, though, that made him, and this book is his enlightening account of the competition from an insider's perspective.