FIELDREPORT - duncan lennard
Weather Eye I
f anyone knows the value of a decent rainsuit, it’s Europe’s 2014 Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley. Honing your game on Ireland’s links
courses tends to give you an appreciation of good outerwear. As 2010 vice captain, McGinley also witnessed first-hand the problems the American team faced with their rainwear at a soggy Celtic Manor. With his typically thorough approach, McGinley
may even know that Perth’s Highland Games have been washed out four times in the past eight years – and that according to climatologists, Perthshire rainfall is on the up. Certainly, the importance of keeping warm and dry at Gleneagles in a late Scottish autumn will not be lost on the Irishman – a theory backed up by the level of interest he is taking in the garments ProQuip are developing for his team “Paul has been completely involved in the
Mittens and point of sale ProQuip water test
process of creating our 2014 outerwear,” says ProQuip’s general manager Russell Brooks. “He has gone through a wide range of designs, chosen his favourites and tailored things to his requirements. His input has seen us develop a new fabric technology designed to take the Scottish climate into account. That fabric is more about keeping wind and cold out; the moisture control from the Trophy suit the team used in 2012 really can’t be bettered.” The Cup suit itself is still
being developed, and styles and technologies will not be revealed until Ryder Cup Tuesday. But each one will be custom-fitted for the team member, a state of affairs made possible by running the tape measure over 20 or so of the players-most-likely at Wentworth’s BMW Championship in May. And unlike 2012, when only 125 garments were made available to purchase on the suit’s launch, the 2014
10 SGBGOLF
Official European team outerwear supplier ProQuip head into a Ryder Cup year on the back of their broadest range to date. The brand’s general manager Russell Brooks details the most popular new lines, and reveals how the range will be freshened up further for 2014
version will be for sale to the public from launch. Ryder Cup year forms a natural focus for a brand
that has kitted out some 20 teams, on both sides, since 1983. This perhaps explains why ProQuip chose a non-Cup year – 2013 – to bring to market its biggest ever range.
Over the past 12 months the brand has marketed
performance baselayers, technical-fabric performance polos and also pioneering water repellent knitwear for the first time. These new lines have joined the brand’s traditional strengths of light
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