No-one is better qualified to express the pride being felt in Henrik Stenson’s homeland than the man who should have been the first Swede to win a major championship 22 years earlier.
As he reflected upon what had happened in Troon last weekend there was no sign of envy from Jesper Parnevik, who suffered two narrow defeats in Open Championships played on the Ayrshire coast, but there was some satisfaction at knowing that he might have helped from afar by tweeting his support.
"There's a lot of pressure in a situation like that and I did that as I wanted him not to be burdened by the heavy weight of trying to become the first Swede to win a men's major,” said the 51-year-old.
“So I felt I needed to acknowledge what he was bidding to achieve. It was unfortunate that I had been in that position myself at Troon but couldn't finish it off. It tugged my heart that it seemed to give him a boost, which was fantastic."
In saying so he fully acknowledged the fact that a number of Swedish women, including Annika Sorenstam who claimed 10, have won major championships in the interim, but he noted that the Open's status adds an extra dimension.
"First and foremost, this was a big thing for Swedish golf as we have waited a long time for it,” said Parnevik.
“I had a lot close calls and the Swedish females, of course, have spoiled us in the majors. I actually think your man in the street in Sweden probably didn't know that we hadn't done before so didn't actually realise how big it is. It was huge in the press back home.
“The females have spoiled us forever with major trophies, Annika in particular. I don't think the Swedish, non-golfing, even sports fan understand maybe how big this is in a way, because I think most of them don't even know the guys haven't done this yet because we have so many trophies throughout the years, but hopefully it's going to be a big push for the new generation to come along and every step we as Swedes take, a fairly new sport like this, it's huge.
"I think Ove Sellberg was the first guy to win on The European Tour and that made myself and other guys feel, ‘Oh, it's possible, we can actually do this.’ Then with The Ryder Cup and then I started winning on the US and then when I had my chances to win majors.
“So every step is huge and I think this is going to make a lot of young kids realise this is possible. Hopefully for the players that are playing now and especially Henrik, the floodgates might open big time, now. I can see, three, four, five more majors in him.
"If you look at the way he has played over the last five years, it was only a matter of time, really. The cool thing was the way he did it as he played unbelievable over the last two days in particular."
Parnevik almost missed Stenson’s big moment because of a delayed flight and while he said he felt inspired by his compatriot’s performance he is sceptical about his chances of maintaining the recent run of Swedish dominance in Scotland.
“It would actually be a trifecta, of course, because Alex Noren also won the Scottish Open, but I can't say that I'm in great form,” he observed, noting that he has not played since the Senior Players' Championship in mid-June.
He is among three Swedes in the field, along with Anders Forsbrand, a six time winner on the European Tour and Magnus Atlevi, while there are others at Carnoustie whose presence underlines just what Stenson achieved given that 29 years had elapsed since Seve Ballesteros was the previous Continental European to win the title.
In the interim Bernhard Langer claimed his second major title at the 1993 US Masters and while he has never won the Open he has claimed the Seniors version twice, including the last time it was held at Carnoustie in 2010 and he believes the way Stenson and Phil Mickelson played can help others.
“It was fantastic the way the two guys played,” he said.
“To be 20-under and 17-under in these conditions, I mean, they weren't easy conditions, right. When you see good shots and see putts being made, it sometimes helps you to do the same thing.”
Also taking part is the Continental golfer who had the most famous miss of all, but Jean van de Velde, the Frenchman whose paddle in the Barry Burn opened the way for Paul Lawrie to claim his victory in 1999, but for all that he claimed to “love being back here” he said he has not been playing much so seems unlikely to contend.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here