Lee Westwood believes Europe have the right blend of youth and experience to retain the Ryder Cup at Valhalla later this week.

The European team flew out of Heathrow Airport on Monday morning and shortly before they boarded a flight for Kentucky, Westwood claimed Europe were well-equipped to secure what would be an unprecedented fourth consecutive victory.

"It's my sixth one so I'm getting used to it now but each one's got its own different challenges and we're looking forward to this one," he told Sky Sports.

"Along with Sergio (Garcia), the players who haven't played before, or only played once in Europe and not in America, will be looking to us for a bit of experience and what's going to happen.

"Sergio's been playing very well recently and Padraig is coming off the back of a couple of major victories which is very impressive and I've had a couple of good results so we're not afraid to play well over there and show them what we can do.

"All the guys have a lot of experience of playing in the States and most of us have played in Ryder Cups before which is vital."

However, Westwood - who made his Ryder Cup debut at Valderrama back in 1997 - warned that he and his European team-mates faced a tough test.

"In everybody else's eyes we're favourites, but over the last couple of years we've considered ourselves at least joint favourites and the amount of times we've won recently we've gone into it feeling very confident - now the bookies have just caught up with the way we've been thinking," he added.

"The Americans are going to be really up for it this time around to stop our run, we've won it three times in a row now and the last two convincingly so it's a case of holing the putts at the right time and taking the momentum with you and seeing what happens."