Solheim Cup is a gut check for Ryann O’Toole

Ryann O’Toole was as surprised as anybody when she was chosen for the U.S. Solheim Cup team, the women’s golf equivalent to the Ryder Cup.

When captain Rosie Jones called O’Toole’s name last month, O’Toole said she thought, “Wow, Rosie’s going with her gut rather than going with the stats. She went out on a limb and now, yeah, now it’s up to me.”

The U.S. begins Solheim Cup competition Friday at the Jack Nicklaus-designed Killeen Castle course in Dunsany, Ireland. O’Toole’s 11 teammates include Michelle Wie, playing assistant captain Juli Inkster and 2011 LPGA tournament winners Stacy Lewis and Brittany Lincicome.

The European team is led by the world’s second-ranked golfer, Suzann Pettersen of Norway, and Germany’s Sandra Gal, who won the tournament in City of Industry last winter.

O’Toole, 24, is from San Clemente and went to UCLA. She learned the game at the San Clemente Municipal course, a place she has outgrown, according to pro Rocky Rafkin, because O’Toole can’t hit a driver and keep it on the range.

“Downhill a little bit, she’ll knock it 300 yards easy,” Rafkin said.

This year, her first on the LPGA Tour, O’Toole has played 10 events, made six cuts, and finished in the top 10 twice. She is 43rd on the money list. And yet she’s representing the U.S. in the most prestigious female team golf competition in the world as one of two captain’s picks.

“Ryann playing only seven events [before the selection] did not bother me,” Jones said. “Looking at her stats, she had already made close to 90 birdies with two top 10s in pressure events.

“She hits it a ton, plus she’s a good putter. But more important, she has an ease to her demeanor and an air of confidence that I like. She’s not afraid to voice her confidence and she’s spunky in a way.”

To wit: When O’Toole was chosen, she said, “I can’t wait to kick Europe’s butt.” That is just one indication of O’Toole’s competitive fire, said her San Clemente High coach, Mike Hurlbut.

O’Toole, who had been a well-regarded softball player, didn’t start playing golf until she was 13.

“Even as a freshman and almost a rookie at the game,” Hurlbut recalled, “she was in the mix to make the varsity. She was probably a legit varsity player, but we kept her on the freshman team, something she’s never let me forget.”

Both Hurlbut and Rafkin independently shared the same story about O’Toole: She loved to practice so much that she figured out a way to stay on the range longer. She told her mom that if she wrote a letter, O’Toole could stay out on the practice range an extra two hours. So when the coaches would leave at 4, O’Toole would keep hitting balls by herself until 6.

Rafkin said the first time O’Toole came to his junior golf class, “She took a seven-iron and hit a shaped shot 130 yards on her first swing,” Rafkin said. “I’ve taught thousands of people. Never had one do that.”

The 5-foot-7 O’Toole said that she had tried just about every sport by the time she hit that first golf ball. “I fell in love with golf physically and mentally,” she said. “No matter how physically fit you are, how hard you practice, you still have to play in your head.”

Her trajectory hasn’t been straight up. Even as a senior at UCLA, O’Toole often wasn’t on the Bruins’ five-woman playing roster.

After her senior season at UCLA, O’Toole was picked to be on the Golf Channel show “The Big Break: Sandals Resort,” in which players compete for an LPGA Tour exemption. O’Toole was eliminated halfway through the 10-episode show. Instead of getting a free shot at the LPGA, she went to the Futures Tour.

In 2009, she made only $6,237. But in 2010, O’Toole won twice on the minor league circuit and earned conditional LPGA Tour status this year.

“I’m a late bloomer,” she said earlier this week in a telephone interview from Ireland.

O’Toole also missed the cut in the final three LPGA events she played after being chosen for the team.

“I think I was trying too hard,” she said. “I think that will only help me with the team. I know what I’ve got to prove.”

diane.pucin@latimes.com

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