The single-minded individual that is Nick Faldo

GOLF BOOK CLUB: PHILIP REIDreviews 'Life Swings: Nick Faldo, The Autobiography'by Nick Faldo

AH, NICK Faldo. Love him; loathe him; indifferent about him? These days, he’s mainly to be found behind a television microphone or, if on a golf course, it is likely to be one that he has designed or is in the process of doing so. These days, the six-time major winner – and, lest we forget, losing Ryder Cup captain from Valhalla – is a business, and very successful too.

This book, though, is concerned with his playing days before his breakthrough in America as a golfing funny man (really, that’s how they see him) with a mike in hand. And, although it doesn’t include (thankfully?) his whimsical thoughts on what happened in Valhalla, Faldo has a thing or three to say about his own Ryder Cup experiences, both as a player and his spat with Mark James in the run-up to the 1999 match at Brookline.

If you were to look at Faldo’s record as a player, there’s little doubt that he was – with the exception of Seve Ballesteros – one of the greatest golfers to emerge from Europe in any generation.

Six major wins and more than 30 other tournaments around the globe attest to that.

Then, there’s his Ryder Cup record: most appearances, most matches played, most matches won, most points won.

No argument there, for sure.

Yet, Faldo had an aloofness that never enabled him to be taken to the sports fan’s heart.

What this book succeeds in doing is to give us a reason for this, with much of the honesty possibly attributable to ghostwriter Robert Philip.

Whatever, we learn the reason Nick was an only child (because his mother felt it “would be impossible to love another as much as she loved me”) and why he became a loner obsessed with a desire for greatness.

Nick, apparently, excelled in a number of sports as a child. Cricket. Swimming. Tennis. Cycling. It was his cycling coach, an Olympic bronze medallist called Brendan McEwan, who instilled in him a belief that he was to take with him on to the golf course.

“When you get on that bike, you’ve got to hate the other guy’s guts, that’s the attitude you must display if you entertain serious hopes of becoming a champion,” Faldo was told.

He took it literally it seems, and long before the advent of coaching aids Faldo took to honing his swing outside at night (often after playing 36 holes) by using a light from the garden shed to see his reflection in the kitchen window.

He would also swing a pick-axe over his shoulder to develop a slow tempo with his swing.

The nuts and bolts of this book is that it is unquestionably honest, giving us an insight into how he developed as a person (for better or worse) and as a player.

There some really good anecdotes, going back to his amateur and fledgling professional days . . . one of which recounts a time when he was in financial difficulties and was asked to play an exhibition match against Christy O’Connor Snr in Northern Ireland in the late 1980s.

Faldo insists the bottle of poteen he was given that night over a few drinks in a priest’s house revitalised his system and brought him out of what he called his “wilderness years”.

More seriously, Faldo also recounts the time in 1991 – before the British Open – that a threat was issued against one of his daughters, Nathalie.

His children were sent away to a secret location and Faldo played the championship with an armed guard and 24-hour security. He recalls stumbling around Royal Birkdale like a “zombie” that year, when Ian Baker-Finch won.

The following year, Faldo was to win the claret jug at Muirfield. He played superbly for three days, yet it gives an insight into the real Faldo and his insecurities that his biggest worry on the Sunday morning was that he could “blow” a four-shot lead he held over his chasers.

“All the old ‘Nick Foldo’ jibes would resurface and my previous Major victories be discredited’,” he wrote.

So, he stuffed a piece of paper with the words, “you are playing for yourself”, into his pocket.

And, after winning, he broke into a rendition of My Way and – in his “stand-up comic” routine – proceeded to thank the press from the “heart of my bottom”.

In the book, he attempts (without succeeding) to explain what he admits was an “inexplicable” remark, citing criticism he’d received from the British press and from TV commentator Peter Alliss.

In his defence, he wrote that he was “still in semi-shock after the emotional wringer that is Murifield; being bloody-minded or plain stupid, I wanted to say something that would have an impact.”

Stupid or not, it brought home that Faldo is all about Faldo. Maybe that’s not a bad thing, it is just who he is and this book – which delves into his playing career and personal life, with its string of divorces – manages to get across the single-minded individual that is Mr Nick Faldo.

“To be confronted by all the old demons,” he writes, “has been a tough exercise. I thought producing my autobiography would be a gentle stroll down memory lane charting my greatest triumphs with a few humorous anecdotes for light relief; instead of which, it has been a surprisingly difficult process.”

Faldo doesn’t seek the reader’s sympathy.

Apart from his personal life, he describes the split with long-time coach David Leadbetter and the ending of his caddying relationship with Fanny Sunesson.

And he also goes into the background, from his perspective, of the feud he had with the 1999 Ryder Cup captain, Mark James, a person he describes as “a funny old chap”.

1 Does this book change your perception of Nick Faldo as being someone aloof from the sporting public?

2 Faldo describes Seve Ballesteros’s captaincy of the 1997 Ryder Cup win as being that of a “tactical genius” rather than a “lucky conquistador”. Do you agree?

3 Should Faldo’s single-minded obsession with winning serve as a role model for young golfers?

4 Is it your belief that Faldo achieved his full potential?

5 How do you rate this book out of a possible top mark of 10?