European Team Being Inspired By Napoleon Bonaparte, Winston Churchill & ‘Rocky’ (See Video)

Chaska, Minnesota …

The European Team are not short of inspiration this week with quotes from Winston Churchill, Napoleon Bonaparte, ‘Rocky’ and others staring at the team square in the face at this week’s Ryder Cup.

Darren Clarke has transformed the first floor of the Hazeltine clubhouse into a sea of European colours along with photos and quotes.

672189801_dc_9259_4f94dca8196e124928176a6ec2263a1e

And it’s been much through the assistance of sports psychologist Mike Finnegan, who Clarke had turned to working with early in 2011, and would result in two victories that season for Clarke including lifting golf’s ultimate prize.

Though the English-born Finnegan never got the reward he deserved back then it was Clarke who got back in contact with Finnegan to get his input in ‘dressing-up’ the European Team room.

The corridors leading to the team room are donned with banners quoting Bonaparte – “The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos.  The winner will be the one who controls that chaos”.

There’s a quote from US basketball coaching legend John Wooden, who won 10 NCAA championships – “Success is never final. Failure is never fatal.  It’s courage that counts’.

Famed American businessman and ‘mental help’ author W. Clement Stone – “Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve”.

Photo of the Giants Causeway located close to Darren Clarke's home.

Photo of the Giants Causeway located close to Darren Clarke’s home.

One of the well-used Rocky Balboa, ala Sylvester Stallone, quotes also is staring at the European Team – “It ain’t how hard you hit. It’s how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.  It’s about how much you can take and keep moving forward”.

Then inside the sanctity of the team room Clarke has had one of his favourite quotes of Churchill affixed the wall and it appears right under his own – “One unit, one team’ – saying.

It was the same quote – “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never” – from the famed World War 11 leader that Clarke singled out straight after capturing the 2011 Iberdrola Open and just months before being handed the Claret Jug.

672189801_dc_9269_b9bafa3743f31853dc7290fa380633b9

And it had been Finnegan who suggested to Clarke early in 2011 he take up reading famous quotes by way of motivation in trying to end what then had been a three-year victory drought.

There’s a wall featuring the head of a roaring lion with the caption – The Lion Roars – and there’s another wall with a similar giant size snap of the Giants Causeway and with the Ryder Cup perched on the rocks, and with the famed site located just a short drive south of Clarke’s Portrush premises.

But then the late Arnold Palmer has been remembered with pictures of ‘The King’ featured on a wall also showing photos of former European Captains such as Seve Ballesteros, Tony Jacklin, Jose Maria Olazabal and Paul McGinley being held aloft by his Gleneagles winning team.

672189801_dc_9284_acdb66f0512342c8d1d3bd4047151a35

  • Photos thanks to European Tour.


Comments are closed.