Tuesday 30 September 2014 17:08, UK
Lee Westwood hopes one day to captain Europe in the Ryder Cup but not until he has cemented his place as one of the event's all-time greats.
Victories in both days of the foursomes - in the company of cup rookie Jamie Donaldson - took him to within two of Europe's top points scorer Sir Nick Faldo, who leads the way with 25.
The Friday success over Jim Furyk and Matt Kuchar, and the win over Zach Johnson and Kuchar 24 hours later, have already secured Westwood his place in the record books with seven victories from nine appearances.
And the 41-year-old is keen to build on his record at Hazeltine in 2016, where he believes Darren Clarke would be the ideal man to replace Paul McGinley as captain.
I am still relatively young at 41 so I'd like to concentrate on playing for the time being and think about the captaincy in six to eight years.
Speaking to Sky Sports News HQ, he said: "Paul did a great job and I couldn't really pick any holes in his captaincy whatsoever. Any future captain should use his model and his template for Ryder Cups going forward.
"As for the captaincy, people have mentioned Darren Clarke's name. It was mentioned last time and I think it's about the right time in his career to take up the captaincy.
"He is very popular in the United States so I think he would make a good captain in Minnesota.
"For myself, I have thought about being captain one day, but it would be somewhere down the line, not quite yet as hopefully I have one or two more Ryder Cups to play in before I get to the captaincy stage.
"I am still relatively young at 41 so I'd like to concentrate on playing for the time being and think about the captaincy in six to eight years."
And Westwood admits playing in future events affords him the chance to continue mentoring the younger members of the European team.
"It's part of the responsibility of being one of the veteran players," he said. "I did it with Martin (Kaymer) at Celtic Manor, before that with Soren Hansen and this time around, obviously, with Jamie.
"But to be perfectly honest it didn't feel like I was playing with a rookie in Jamie. He has a similar game to me and he just settled into it nicely.
"He didn't seem to feel any pressure and over the first few days of practice rounds I was trying to make him aware of what was about to happen... the atmosphere which would surround the first tee and what it meant to be playing in Ryder Cups.
"So when it came to playing with him in the foursomes and the fourballs it was no real surprise to me how well he performed."
Despite the runaway 16-1/2 - 11/2 success at Gleneagles, Westwood, who is now heading back to the States for the first event of the 2015 schedule - next week's Frys.com Open - says his Ryder Cup debut in 1997 remains one of the highlights of his career.
"This was right up there," he said. "They are all very special but I always say the first one at Valderrama was very special and the one I remember the most with great fondness... and Seve as captain.
"But they've all been special. Record wins at Detroit and the K-Club just after that... but this one is up there. It was fabulous to play in Scotland in front of those kind of galleries and to see such a good team performance.
"It is never easy going in as favourites but we embraced that as we thought we deserved it and obviously the team as a whole performed great."
