European and American practiceJohnny Watterson on how the formalities, always a life-sapping endurance test for the players, are out of the way and they're ready to roll

It would have been easy to understand if the final practice session yesterday was approached with the hushed, reverential tones that are certain to characterise today's first trembling drive from beside the clubhouse out towards the lake that partially wraps around the first hole.

But as blue skies broke through and hauled the event out of the cruel Irish weather joke that had smothered it over the past three days, the players ripped off their waterproofs but went to work in a way that, for the Europeans at least, could only be described as boisterously productive.

Forget the doleful opening ceremony expressions. For players whose overwhelming anxiety is to get going, formality has always been a life-sapping endurance test. Yesterday, Europe joked their way around the course and drew from a locker-room sense of camaraderie with Darren Clarke, almost hyperactively, the leading act.

Clarke was paired with his back-slapping friend, Lee Westwood, an uncomplicated bloke's bloke, as they tried to hole the Spanish armada of Sergio Garcia and Jose Maria Olazabal below the water line, obviously for money. Clarke and Westwood were later announced to follow up the rear in the opening fourballs against Phil Mickelson and Chris DiMarco, while the Spanish duo play David Toms and rookie Brett Wetterich in the third match out.

But while Clarke's face was alternatively locked in concentration and incandescent with laughter and gentle jibes, his golf was almost transcendent. He was the one who chose to attack the pins and rake in birdies.

Between his larking and fooling the first nine holes pars dropped with jaw-dropping regularity. Westwood had indeed found a lucrative partner for the cash match as the Dungannon man birdied the fifth, sixth, and seventh, then missed putts on the par three eighth and ninth, which could have easily given him five in a row. Reassuring too, Clarke, despite Olazabal being the senior player, took charge of the four.

"It will be going out but just coming in at the last bit," he said to Westwood on the fifth green as they lined up the Englishman's putt.

"About two balls?" asked Westwood.

"Yeah," said Clarke before his own birdie roll sank. "Oooh," chirped one of the caddies rubbing his hands.

"All square." Again on the seventh tee box, Olazabal drove marginally down the left side. That fairway falls away into a small but safe valley if the ball is wide, leaving a reasonable line for the next approach over water. "It's okay. It's okay," assured Clarke.

"You're okay down there." And so he was.

Gone was the American team's public relations lapse on Wednesday that caused the crowd to boo them for not teeing off in front of the first-tee gallery. While they opted instead to drop balls where their drives might have landed, before pitching to the green, yesterday they were more obligingly complete in their rounds.

Simulating more accurately what will take place this afternoon, the US played in a foursomes format, the glittering clutch of Tiger Woods and Jim Furyk with Phil Mickelson and Chris DiMarco taking alternate shots rather than each playing their own balls. The short, sharp jolt they received from the fans after playing Wednesday's virtual 12-ball was a lesson learned. Not as rollicking as the European team, yesterday for the Americans it was back to fun, something Woods would like to extend into today.

"We have got two of Europe's best on the first day," said Tiger when it was announced that he and Furyk will open the competition against Padraig Harrington and Colin Montgomerie. "So it will be a fun match.

"We've played a bunch, Paddy and Colin and I. Nothing new," he added.

Tiger in a fun match in the Ryder Cup suggested his idea of fun is a deeply personal one. From this side it was a little like Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali remarking that he is going to have a fun meeting with the Pope. Not really that easy to imagine.

They closed as they had opened, the Europeans exchanging money, with Clarke and Westwood cheerily trousering the cash that the Irishman had seconds before triumphantly waved in the air, the Americans respectfully doffing their hats and signing autographs.

And that brought an end to the beginning of the week, the prologue. The shadow boxing was over and they knew they had one night to put on their game faces. Don't dare ask Tiger for an autograph as he steps to the first tee. Don't expect Harrington to break his stride as hats and programs are stuck in his face. Clarke will not embrace anyone. There will be no eye contact from Mickelson.

In Tom Lehman's speech at the opening ceremony he spoke of the people he had visited in hospital before coming to Europe, American victims of the Iraq war. By the afternoon, the tone had already changed.