Captain Ian Woosnam

Ian Woosnam celebrated his 47th birthday on March 2, 2005, by becoming the Captain of The European Team for The 36th Ryder Cup at The K Club, Straffan, Co. Kildare, in Ireland from September 22-24, 2006.

For Woosnam it is another glittering accolade in a career crammed with supreme achievement. He has won 44 tournaments worldwide with the highlight being his victory in the Masters Tournament at Augusta National in 1991.

Woosnam began the year of 1991 with a round with friends at Oswestry Golf Club. He shot 57! Then he set himself three goals - to win in the United States, to win a Major Championship and to be Number One in the Official World Golf Ranking.

The rest, of course, is history. Woosnam, who had finished Number One on The European Tour Order of Merit in 1990 for the second time in four seasons, followed a win in the Mediterranean Open by capturing the USF&G Classic in New Orleans. Three weeks later he was being helped into the coveted Green Jacket by Nick Faldo after holing an eight foot winning putt on the last green at Augusta.

Moreover, his glorious triumph elevated him to Number One in the world where he would remain throughout 1991 when he also won the Monte Carlo Open in addition to the individual title in the World Cup of Golf - an event he won for Wales with David Llewellyn in 1987 - and the PGA Grand Slam of Golf.

Woosnam said: "When I was a ten year old at Llanmynech I dreamed of having a putt to win the Masters. I lived for that moment, that one moment in time. It was very, very special."

Woosnam was born in Oswestry and moved to Jersey in the Channel Islands in 1993, where he lives with his wife, Glendryth, whom he married in 1983, and their children, Daniel, Rebecca, and Ami. The son of Joan and Harold, a farmer, Woosnam grew up at St Martin's, where Shropshire borders Wales, and first played with a sawn-off set of clubs at Llanmynech. He turned professional in 1976 and made three visits to the Qualifying School before establishing himself on The European Tour on which he gained the first of his 29 victories in the Swiss Open in 1982.

Woosie, as he has always affectionately been known, stands 5 feet 4_ inches tall, but he has always been one of the longest hitters with a simple, unaffected swing on top of arms that could have been borrowed from Popeye. He has always put his arm strength down to the long hours he used to work on his Dad's farm. Driving a tractor as a kid, and hauling bales of hay around as a teenager did more than merely fine-tune this man. It turned him into a powerhouse. In Europe to begin with and then the world.

Now he becomes the 20th golfer to Captain a Ryder Cup Team against the United States and the third Welshman by following in the footsteps of Dai Rees and Brian Huggett. He has played in eight Ryder Cups, enjoying the winning feeling on four occasions and in 1993 he became the first and so far only European Ryder Cup player to claim the maximum four points from the two foursomes and two fourball matches. He partnered Bernhard Langer, whom he has succeeded as the European Ryder Cup Captain, in the foursomes, and Peter Baker, whom he has named as Vice Captain along with Des Smyth, in the fourballs.

Woosnam said: "I've enjoyed the thrill of playing under three superb Ryder Cup Captains in Tony Jacklin, Bernard Gallacher and Seve Ballesteros and, of course, I was Assistant Captain to Sam Torrance in 2002. So, after being involved in no fewer than nine matches from 1983, I can't say how much I missed not being involved in 2004. Now, however, it is all systems go for 2006. The qualifying process for the European Team has started, Glen and I are involved in Ryder Cup business on a day-to-day basis and we all cannot wait to get to The K Club and feel that very special atmosphere that we know will be in the air in Ireland."

Full Name: Ian Harold Woosnam MBE
Residence: Wales
Birthdate: 2.3.58, Oswestry, England
Height/Weight: 5ft 4in / 12st (165cm 76kgs)
Family: Wife: Glendryth (m. 1983); Children: Daniel (1985), Rebecca (1988), Ami (1991)
Interests: Fishing, snooker, sports
Turned Professional: 1976