Three potential LPGA Stars are living and training here in Mesquite, Nevada. Many in the local golf community already know these young golf prodigies as they are fixtures at the Oasis Golf Club from November through March every year. The Mulhalls are the quintessential golf family. Dad, Chris, is a PGA Pro at Rolling Green Country Club in Green River, Wyoming, where he also teaches when he’s not traveling with, coaching, and caddying for his girls in their events. Mom, Heather, is also an avid golfer. She home schools their three girls during the prime golf season, and travels with what she calls her “party of five,” supporting their golf dreams. The remaining three Mulhalls are the couple’s darling daughters Ali, 11; Molli, 8; and Palmer, 4. Notice their first initials in order? C-H-A-M-P: an unplanned, but perfect acronym for this family of golf lovers.
Ali and Molli play on tour already. The US Kids Golf Tour, that is. At just 11 years old, Ali has already won over 170 (out of about 200) tournaments around the country in her blossoming career, plus several Player of the Year awards in multiple states. She already has two holes in one, and her personal best score for 18 holes is 65, which set the women’s course record at White Mountain Golf Course when she was only 10 years old. Ali plays a Titleist ProV1X golf ball customized with that number (65) and her personal “Aligator” logo. She drives the ball consistently around 215 yards, sometimes out to 240. She and Molli cherish their extraordinarily special putters, which were given to Ali personally by Scotty Cameron, who is now her personal putting coach. When she was just eight years old, Ali was the youngest player ever to be invited to the Scotty Cameron Tour Studio, beating out Michelle Wie, who was the previous youngest to go at 10. You may know that PGA and LPGA Tour players use the “circle T” putter 
by Scotty. Rarer than those are the coveted “circle L” putters, which were originally given to Scotty’s personal friends as a joke, with the L signifying “Loser.” He gave Ali a Circle L and changed it to “Lucky.” It sure seems to be lucky for her so far. Her favorite golfers are Lydia Ko, Tiger Woods, and Jordan Spieth – all record setting dominant winners with intense focus. She also favors Natalie Gulbis, who is known to come to Mesquite on occasion, and the two have met several times. Natalie even invited Ali to her LPGA event in Phoenix, where she walked inside the ropes with her. Ali also had the privilege of putting for Natalie in the pro-am there.
Ali’s goal is to be playing on the LPGA Tour by age 16. Her father told me she is the most dedicated person he knows. I believe him and can certainly see that in not only her swing, but in her demeanor. I don’t see anything stopping her from achieving that goal, nor do I see her ego ever catching up to her ability. She’s humble, extremely poised, and charming, and will make a great addition to the Tour when her time comes. If you’re a gambling person, putting money on seeing Ali on the big stage in five years would probably be a safe bet.
Next in line is Molli Tee Mulhall (is this a golf family or what?), who has eight years to achieve the same goal and 
compared to Ali at the same age, she’s got a head start. She’s already won 50 of her 74 tournaments played. With a Barbie logo on her Titlelist ProV1X(number 8 – for her age), she drives the ball around 140 yards. Molli also has some Player of the Year honors and was the youngest ever to qualify for the US Kids World Championships when she was only six. Ali and Molli both work hard all year to get to the World Championships at Pinehurst in North Carolina. Outside of their home course at Oasis Palmer, Pinehurst #8 is their favorite golf course because of its immaculate condition.
The littlest Mulhall, Palmer (you know where that name originated), doesn’t quite have competition fever yet at age four, but you bet she’s out there swinging 
andputting and touring with the family. As you can see by their matching outfits, all three girls are fond of the color pink so naturally they’re fans of Paula Creamer as well.
Ali and Molli are also budding entrepreneurs. They are looking to start their own line of golf clothes for kids. They talked to me about how they have to order clothes online and how there doesn’t seem to be much representation in retail shops (and especially pro shops) for the youth market. Their mom, Heather, and I, told them about how that used to be the same way for women in general and that it has improved, but better to start now than later.
The girls are also trying to bring a US Kids Golf Tour event to Mesquite, and have already initiated talks with the tour and with The Rising Star Sports Ranch Resort to try to make it happen. It seems like it would be a perfect fit for Rising Star, great for Mesquite, and great for the tour to have an event here. If you’d like to see it happen, maybe make a call or send an email to either of the interested parties to express that.
As amateurs, the girls can’t take on official sponsors, so they operate several fundraisers on local courses during the season to raise money for their travel, if you’re interested in contributing. Meanwhile, you can follow them on Instagram @golf.champ and watch their progress and results on tour at USKidsGolf.com.
Oh by the way – I neglected to get a photo with my playing partners Garnette and Susan that first day (although I did put Garnette’s shoes up on Facebook for the Golfchick’s best shoe contest). And while I don’t seem to have any pics of me in my golf attire that day, I did snap a close up of my top because it’s a cool Golf Chick logo shirt I wanted to share with you.
some prizes but I got bumped for time. They did invite me up to make a brief announcement to the group that I would be doing the prize giveaway over by the pool after the dinner. Trouble with that is, people had plans and got lured by the casinos so we only had about 45 people show up. Oh well, more prize opps for them! That night I gave away a 
time record round of 82, which I shot there last year during the Mesquite Am. I had hoped for some more of that magic. Alas, it wasn’t to be. I shot the exact same score as the day before (101) which I figured would put me somewhere near the middle of the pack. Not good enough. However, it was a fun day with my playing partners. I rode with “Badass Vicki,” who is always up on stage when they need volunteers for entertainment or on the video reel doing something crazy. You can’t miss her and if you’ve been to a Mesquite Am you probably know who she is. In the other cart were Roxanne and Kathy, two terrific ladies. Incidentally, I played The Palms with Kathy last year when I shot my record round. This year, it was her turn. How awesome is that? In the pic Left to Right – Vicki, me, Roxanne, Kathy. Every one of us landed that green you see across the ravine. Sure it’s a big green but that’s a daunting carry in person. No birdies were made but two of us, including me, made par.
After the round, I did a little shopping at the Palms pro shop to spend my winnings from the long drive and got a really cute skort. Â *Side note: That morning before the round I spent one of my certificates on a couple gloves since I left mine out on my bag in the hot car and it got all hard and gross. Â This is exactly why I don’t leave my golf shoes in the car. If you don’t know this, hear me now. The heat and sun will remove the luster and shorten the lives of your leather goods including your awesome shoes.
up my mind to relax, drink, take pictures and not care so much about the golf for our round at Casablanca Golf Club. I also figured that might even help my game. I had fun playing with Brittany, who was a hot little number from Florida and a great sport. She wore a super short skirt (pictured at right) just for my twitter followers. She was also super chill and a cool chick. I’m sure we’d hang out and play golf if we lived near each other. I started the day with a bloody mary but moved on to rum soon after that. I was actually having a decent round but didn’t know it. Brittany mentioned it to me on the last hole, so I proceeded to take an 11 there. Let’s just say it involved water and someone’s backyard and that my “good shot” on the entire hole went in the greenside bunker. With that 11, I shot 96. Thanks a lot, Brittany. I thought you were cool. Heh. My scored landed me smack in the middle of my flight for the tournament. Much better than last year’s DFL, but still disappointing. I like to play well and I like to make sure my peeps have a good time. I’m going to be working towards doing better in both areas for next year. And if you have any suggestions, please let me know what you’d like to see to make The Golf Chick portion of the event better for you!
Back in the tent for the dinner party, all the flight winners were announced. I was happy to see so many of the Golf Chick participants in the money and some even moved onto the championship round the next day! Huge congratulations to Dana Boyette, who was the 1st runner up for low net overall! She was also the most active Golf Chick player in the shoe contest and on FB in general (she’s the one who snapped a pic of me tweeting!) and won herself a prize for all that activity. Thanks for being so fun, Dana, and well done! Those of us not in the championship round did, of course, find the dance floor yet again.
The Mesquite Am occurs the week of Memorial Day. Monday isn’t an actual tournament day, but the day everyone registers and either just arrives, plays a practice round or participates in the organized skins game. I haven’t done the skins game yet but plan to next year (Hi George)! For the last three years my routine has been to dress in a red, white and blue golf outfit and hit one of the courses for a leisurely practice round and this year was no different. I planned to play with an up and coming LPGA hopeful but she 
choice of the navy blue golf top. As you can see from the photo, I’m so patriotic I went for the lady liberty look with my hair. No, those aren’t just unplanned flyaways. Really.
The city of Mesquite celebrated its 25th birthday this year and the timing coincided with the Mesquite Am tournament. Each night was considered a birthday celebration and came with a theme. Though I couldn’t always logically follow the theme throughout the night, the dessert tables were fabulous.
though perhaps not in the way the “talent” intended. The first night we were 
Night two brought us the phenomenon known as the Mesquite-Toes. It’s a troupe of more than 50 female “dancers” with an average age of 66. And one man. They are raising money to take the entire group to China to perform on the Great Wall. They better install some kind of bumpers or side rails on that baby. Anyway, the team seemed to be endless in numbers as well as costumes and they just kept circling in and around the stage for what felt like hours. Each song had its own performers and associated costumes which got crazier with each change. The longer the show went on, the more it seemed to approach some level of grandma porn. The first song and dance was cute – “oh, that one looks like my grandma!” The second was variety – “oh look, new costumes.” And it just kept going and going … and going.
Michelle Wie Kia Commercial
I’m pretty sure the casual viewer doesn’t put nearly this much thought into it and maybe at the most decide whether they prefer this commercial or the one with the hamsters. (I love the drummer hamster!)
And here’s the link to it on YouTube in case the embed code fails (as I know they do on here from time to time).
Next post.