Matt Dunham / AP

Padraig Harrington, left, pats runner up Sergio Garcia on the back during the presentation ceremony for the claret jug.

You didn’t know anything about golf to enjoy the show anymore than you’d need to know anything about NASCAR to know that when four cars start the final lap in a virtual dead heat, it’s worth staying around to see how it all turns out.

There were a few crashes on that final lap, none more spectacular than that of Romero, an unheralded Argentine who was holding victory in his hand on the 17th tee and proceeded to Van de Velde it away with a couple of shots that were as brave as they were dumb.

You could say he choked, and you’d be right. But he also performed heroically. You can say that of the entire field — they all choked and they all triumphed.

And that, too, makes great competition, because you knew as certainly as you know your own name that nothing was going to be easy, that everybody was going to have a chance to blow it, just as everybody would have a chance to win it.

Harrington could have won it on 18 with even a bogey, but he made double bogey, twice visiting the water on his way to his six. Then it was Garcia’s turn to make a par and win, but he couldn’t do that, either, settling for a bogey of his own after what would have been the winning putt skated across the left edge of the hole, dipped as if thinking of dropping in, then skittering mockingly away — another chance lost for the hard-luck kid.

In the playoff, Harrington made birdie on the first hole to Garcia’s bogie.

The Spaniard almost got it back, hitting the pin on the par-three 16th, then watching the ball scamper away out of easy birdie range.

Garcia has made a career from such moments, and when it was all done, Harrington said he “commiserated” with Sergio. And that’s another thing you don’t run into in your average golf tournament, a golfer who can use the word “commiserate” in a sentence.

I’m not sure even Tiger could have pulled that one off.