[Photo: Johnnie Izquierdo]

In a sea of red numbers on the opening day of the American Express tournament, Blades Brown’s opening 67 didn’t really stand out. But when you consider he’s backed that up with a second-day 60 to tie Scottie Scheffler at the top of the leaderboard after 36 holes AND factor in the whirlwind week he’s having, his performance becomes a lot more impressive.

That’s because this is Brown’s second tournament of the week. The 18-year-old finished T-17 at the Bahamas Great Abaco Classic, the Korn Ferry Tour’s second event of the season, on Wednesday afternoon. Then managed to travel 3,000 miles (nearly 5,000 kilometres) and across a couple of time zones to make his Thursday morning tee-time at La Quinta Country Club.

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Pretty wild. And, again, he’s shot 67-60 after all that. Of course, it helps to have help from someone with access to a private jet.

“Finished the round. Had to quickly take a shower and then drove to the airport,” Brown said after his opening round in Palm Springs, California, where he’s playing on a sponsor exemption. “Then hopped on a massive OneFlight jet. Ferren Rajput, he was kind of enough to escort me on the way here. It was a six-hour flight. I think it was his jet, so it was awesome. My second time ever flying private. It was beautiful. Then, yeah, arrived here around 8pm last night. Got some Panda Express. Got some groceries. Slept, started sleeping at 10. Then woke up at around 5, got here a little early to make a couple putts, because, I mean, it was blowing 30 [miles per hour] the entire way [in the Bahamas], and then you get here and then it’s perfect. So it’s two completely different situations. But I had a lot of fun today, and bogey-free round, I’ll take that any day of the week.”

Ah, to be 18. Nothing a little Panda Express can’t solve.

Anyway, the PGA Tour put together a cool video documenting Brown’s wild day in which he mentions that he also took English and econ. exams the day before teeing it up in the Bahamas to graduate from high school. Again, whirlwind!

https://twitter.com/PGATOUR/status/2014491444925325469

“I love what I do. I love to play golf. You’re telling me I get to play, hopefully, eight straight competitive golf rounds, one being on the Korn Ferry Tour and the other one on the PGA Tour?,” Brown told reporters on Thursday. “Like, what’s not to love about that? So essentially the first four rounds on the Korn Ferry Tour, those were my practice rounds for this event. And then I got here and thought I played pretty well today.”

With the American Express having a three-day cut, Brown is assured of playing seven rounds in a row and is all but guaranteed of making that eight. Come Sunday night in California, even this teen phenom will have to be tired. We think. At the very least, he’ll have earned a feast from Panda Express.