1959 Ryder Cup

13th Ryder Cup Matches
Dates		November 6–7
Venue		Eldorado Golf Club
Location		Indian Wells, California
Captains		Sam Snead (USA) Dai Rees (Great Britain)
8½   3½
United States wins the Ryder Cup
«1957		1961»

The 13th Ryder Cup Matches were held at the Eldorado Golf Club in Indian Wells, California. The United States team won the competition by a score of 8½ to 3½ points. The British who were once again led by Dai Rees were unable to repeat the heroics of two years earlier and were comprehensively beaten on American soil. The Americans took a 2½-1½ lead in the Foursomes before finishing off the British challenge in the singles by winning five matches with two matches finishing all square to win the cup back. The British won just one foursome match with Christy O'Connor and Peter Alliss beating Art Wall and Doug Ford by 3 & 2 and one singles match when Eric Brown beat Cary Middlecoff by 4 & 3 however by the time his match was won the United States had already won the competition.

Format

The Ryder Cup is a match play event, with each match worth one point. Since the inaugural 1927 Ryder Cup, the format consisted of 4 foursome (alternate shot) matches on the first day and 8 singles matches on the second day, for a total of 12 points. Therefore, 6½ points were required to win the Cup. All matches were played to a maximum of 36 holes. This would be the last Ryder Cup competition to be played under this format.

Teams

Friday's foursome matches

	Results
Hunt/Brown	5 & 4	Rosburg/Souchak
Rees/Bousfield	2 holes	Boros/Finsterwald
O'Connor/Alliss	3 & 2	Wall/Ford
Weetman/Thomas	halved	Snead/Middlecoff
1½	Session	2½
1½	Overall	2½

Saturday's singles matches

	Results
Norman Drew	halved	Doug Ford
Ken Bousfield	3 & 2	Mike Souchak
Harry Weetman	6 & 5	Bob Rosburg
Dave Thomas	6 & 5	Sam Snead
Christy O'Connor	7 & 6	Art Wall
Dai Rees	1 hole	Dow Finsterwald
Peter Alliss	halved	Jay Hebert
Eric Brown	4 & 3	Cary Middlecoff
2	Session	6
3½	Overall	8½

References