GOLF: The stubble on his unshaven face tells its own tale. The fact that Padraig Harrington is on the green at The Grove, a new five-star resort outside Watford, with one shoe on and nothing but a sock on his left foot as he practices his putting ahead of the €5.8 million WGC-American Express Championship is perhaps worthy of a more detailed explanation.
As the hours grow into days since Europe's record-equalling win in the Ryder Cup on Sunday last, Harrington - "I'm surprisingly unmotivated and struggling to go out and play golf," he confessed - has resorted to an old putting drill. The reasoning behind removing a shoe is that his left leg is half an inch shorter than his right, and putting with just his sock on encourages him to lean on his left side. You see, there is always a reason.
The reasoning for his tiredness is more simple, more to do with the sense of relief that things should have gone so well in Straffan. Harrington had been Fáilte Ireland and O2's public face for the Ryder Cup, and he is now looking forward to the day when his face won't stare back from posters to those using the urinals in the public toilets at Dublin Airport and elsewhere.
"There was more to last week, not necessarily the week itself, but in the build-up to the event. So, maybe, there is more of a come down (for me) after last week.
"There'd be such a big build-up all year, for the past six years in fact. It was a relief (to win) as I didn't want to lose the Ryder Cup in the Ireland."
One other thing has impressed Harrington, and that is the number of American players who have approached him to commend the Irish crowds. As Tiger Woods put it yesterday: "The fans were incredible, I think the best I've ever seen. They were the most fair, most appreciative that I've ever seen in the Ryder Cup matches."
Harrington, one of 21 Ryder Cup protagonists who have moved on to this Kyle Philips-designed course north of London - the exceptions being team-mate Paul McGinley and Americans Phil Mickelson and Vaughn Taylor - emerged from the match with just one half-point from a possible five but with no regrets.
He explained: "I did what I could. Looking back, I didn't play as well as I could the first morning (fourballs). But, after that, I stuck to my guns and I've no regrets at all about it. I came up against it in a few matches and I didn't hole the putts at the right time. Whatever way you want to look at it, I did as well as I could have in that week.
"As long as the team wins, it doesn't matter who gets the points. It would be no consolation if I won five out of five and the team lost. It would be very disappointing if I only got half a point and the team lost by half a point or a point. I might have been gutted over that. And, to be honest, I am not even gutted (at getting half a point). I honestly couldn't have done any more. I couldn't have tried any harder, or worked any harder. I couldn't have been any more disciplined, or had a better attitude. All those things I was good at last week so I can't look back and have any complaints at all.
"I gave it everything I needed to give it. My focus was good and my attitude was good. That's very important. When you know you've done what you can, and that's it, you tend not to get stressed."
Harrington is one of two Irishmen, along with Darren Clarke, in the field here at The Grove, where Tiger Woods is the defending champion. The big question is, can the European players take the momentum from The K Club with them into an individual tournament? Certainly, there's also been a considerable amount of talk in the locker room with the fact that the World Golf Championships, apart from the World Cup taking place in China in 2007 to 2009, will all be staged in the United States.
But Harrington is philosophical about such a scenario. "It's an open market. And, with regards to tournaments, strength of fields and such like, it should be an open and fair competition to get events there, there, wherever. If someone is putting up the sponsorship and they want the event in a certain place, then that is the sponsor's (prerogative) . . . they are putting the money in."
When someone put it to Harrington yesterday that Europe ruled the world of golf, given that they'd beaten the US in the Ryder Cup and the US had beaten the Rest of the World in the Presidents Cup, he replied that Europe couldn't rule the world until its players started to win majors. "I think European players will win majors and the sooner that happens the better. Hopefully, it will open the floodgates but we do need win a major. If someone does, that would make it easier for others." The American Express may not be a major, but it is the next best thing and a good place to start. We'll see if the team momentum can be carried forward to an individual event.
