Jordan Spieth could feel the pressure.
His wife, Annie, wanted them to get an RV.
“We tried one at the Harding Park PGA (Championship in 2020), so we tested it out there,” said Spieth, who opened the Sony Open in Hawaii with a 6-under 64 to share the early first-round lead with Chris Kirk. “Annie wanted one for a while.
“I didn't really want one prior to (son) Sammy, like, knowing he would sleep through the night and schedule and all that,” he continued, “because close quarters compared to renting a house.”
Spieth, 29, is a 13-time PGA TOUR winner. He is coming off a T13 at the Sentry Tournament of Champions in Maui last week, and racked up a 5-0-0 record at the Presidents Cup. He seemed to have it all.
But he didn’t have an RV, even though “the bus” has been a staple on the PGA TOUR for years, with converts including Jason Day, John Daly, Jimmy Walker, and others. With their son sleeping through the night, the Spieths finally bought their own rig last fall, and Jordan stayed in it by himself the week of THE CJ CUP in South Carolina.
Of course, they can’t use it at the Sony (it doesn’t float, alas), where Spieth hit 15 greens in regulation and took just 27 putts in working his way to the top of the leaderboard. His only regret was failing to birdie the par-5 ninth hole, his last of the day.
No matter how the golf goes, he and his family will be living the RV life in 2023 for the first time.
“Just glamping, you know,” Spieth said. “Slumming it. Should be a lot of fun. The reason was kind of to have home on the road. Got the same mattress I have at home, and we'll leave a lot of Sammy's stuff on the bus, therefore won't to have pack a whole lot and can ride on it a lot in between events given the way the west coast swing – and especially the Florida swing.
“Should make traveling and getting settled and packing up quite a bit easier,” he continued. “Yeah, look forward to it. … Annie is trying to recruit a lot of our friends out here to do it, so we'll see in the next few years if that works or not.”