‘Getting More Disgusting’: Amanda Balionis Reveals Horror Travel Story That’s Keeping Her Up at Night

For Amanda Balionis, life on the PGA Tour seems to be like a busy, lengthy, relentless commute. The CBS reporter has been overlaying a few of the greatest moments in golf this season, from the 2026 PGA Championship at Aronimink to the CJ Cup Byron Nelson at TPC Craig Ranch this week. And between the tournaments, she was in a rental automobile, driving herself from one cease to the subsequent. But on a kind of late-night drives house, she encountered an uncomfortable scenario that left her shocked.

“Okay, so I was driving home today. This is a new one. In my rental car, I kept smelling something that smelled like a sweaty man. And I’m like, is it me? I’m checking. It’s not me. And then I realised it was my seatbelt. How sweaty must a person be to saturate a seatbelt? And like, are you not wearing a shirt? Are you just bare-chested in a rental car and sweating responsibly with your seatbelt on? It’s on me right now. Has anyone ever experienced this in a rental car—a sweaty seatbelt? It’s getting more disgusting the more I think about it,” Balionis wrote on Instagram, calling it “new travel horror unlocked.”

Advertisement

Rental automobile seatbelts are among the many most persistently neglected surfaces in customary cleansing procedures. After automobiles are returned, most firms do a fundamental cleansing that covers vacuuming interiors, disinfecting high-touch areas, cleansing the home windows, and eradicating any trash. But seatbelts not often make that record.

Balionis covers roughly 22 to 23 occasions on the PGA Tour, together with the Masters, the PGA Championship, the Genesis Invitational, the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, the RBC Heritage, and the TOUR Championship. She is on the street rather a lot, so we’re positive she has loads of different tales like this to share, however that doesn’t imply it’s at all times simple. For ladies, navigating skilled or any journey comes with going through surprising discomfort, and the golf world can be not untouched by these.

For occasion, on the 2023 LPGA Tournament of Champions at Lake Nona, gamers arrived to seek out that no personal locker room was obtainable. Ironically, the world was shared with VIP sponsors and event workers. Yet there was neither storage nor privateness for 29 professionals competing that week. In reality, four-time LPGA winner Ryan O’Toole stated at the moment:

“I’m not mad at the club, I’m not mad at the sponsor, I’m annoyed at the LPGA for just being an overlooked factor.”

Advertisement

After the difficulty was highlighted, the LPGA responded by ordering 36 non permanent lockers to the venue, which arrived the identical afternoon, hours earlier than the primary spherical. Instances like these function reminders of how simply fundamental wants for girls in sports activities might be neglected, and it usually goes past hygiene.

As for Balionis, she isn’t any stranger to journey. During the 2025 NFL season, she had opened up about battling a pinched nerve in her C4-C5 vertebrae that was sending capturing ache down into her shoulder blade. Yet she did her greatest to get well earlier than a grueling stretch of weeks on the bottom because the reporter. Similarly, Balionis has been the middle of a few of the most compelling storylines of the 2026 season.

Still on the course, Amanda Balionis retains the dialog going at TPC Craig Ranch

Balionis is presently on the bottom in Texas as a part of the complete CBS Sports on-air crew for the 2026 CJ Cup Byron Nelson, alongside Jim Nantz, Trevor Immelman, and Frank Nobilo. It has been an extended stretch of occasions for her after she simply coated the PGA Championship at Aronimink.

Advertisement

On the sphere, Balionis has been in the course of the dialog of the week’s most notable names. After Wyndham Clark carded 66 on Saturday to maneuver into rivalry, she got here to him with a really particular query. She identified that he was ranked 132nd on the PGA Tour in strokes gained placing, coming into the event, and it’s a sharp distinction to how he had been taking part in greens all week.

Clark’s response was witty, as he stated, “Jeez, I don’t think I’ve ever been that bad at putting stats, so thanks for letting me know. I’ve been hitting good shots. I played good at Augusta. I played good in Hilton Head. I’ve had some nice goals. I just didn’t make putts. So now, to make putts, it really does free it up.”

Heading into the ultimate rounds, two shot off the lead, Clark seems to be like a participant who could have discovered his timing proper in the meanwhile. And as for Balionis, she’s recovering from the horror story as she will get able to be again on the course.

Trending Articles

Advertisement

The submit ‘Getting More Disgusting’: Amanda Balionis Reveals Horror Travel Story That’s Keeping Her Up at Night appeared first on EssentiallySports. Add BasicallySports as a Preferred Source by clicking here.