Houma junior golfers win at U.S. event

Two Houma junior golfers won top honors this year on the eight-event U.S. Kids Golf summer tour.

Gabrielle Bradley, 11, and Brennan Hamner, 6, were named Player of the Year in their respective age groups at the season-ending, nine-hole tour championship at Beaver Creek Golf Course in Zachary, La., on July 22.

They accumulated the most points on the Baton Rouge-based tour, which ran from May through July.

This is Gabrielle’s third Player of the Year title on a U.S. Kids Golf tour and Brennan’s first full year on the tour.

Both golfers also met minimum qualifying scores to earn invitations to the 2009 U.S. Kids World Championship in Pinehurst, N.C. There, junior golfers ages 12 and under compete with some of the best young golfers from around the world.

Father Knows Best

When Gabrielle was younger, her father, Rob, a PGA professional and director of golf at Ellendale Country Club, gave her three choices.

“She could play golf, tennis or swimming because that’s what I have access to,” he said.

“I picked golf and swimming,” she replied.

At age 3, Rob Bradley put a golf club in his daughter’s hands. By age 8, Gabrielle began entering tournaments. It’s been her first love ever since.

She won Player of the Year twice before (2006 and 2007), but this year is her first time qualifying for the world championships.

“It will be really cool to meet all the other kids from all over the world,” she said.

With dad as her coach and caddy, Gabrielle’s skills have developed rapidly. Her season-low score was a 47.

She considers putting as the strongest and most accurate part of her game, but hitting more fairways with her driver has elevated her game, according to Rob Bradley.

He also said his offspring plays well under pressure.

“When Gabby made the putt to qualify for the world championship, she knew she had to par that hole,” Rob Bradley recalled. “She knocked it right down the middle, and then knocked it on the green. She was about 15 feet from the hole with a five-foot breaking putt. She hit it right in the center of it and said, ‘Daddy, that’s the way Tiger does it, doesn’t he?’ I said, ‘Yep, that sure is.'”

Gabrielle has become such a fixture at Ellendale she plays rounds with other club members. Nicholls State golfer Theunette Van der Walt has taken her under her wing.

The key to Gabrielle’s success, her father said, is keeping golf just a game.

“We have a really relaxed attitude about it,” he said. “Some of the other dads get pretty intense about it, but we just kind of joke around on the golf course while she’s playing.”

When Gabrielle is not on the course, she can usually be found in the pool. She has been on the YMCA Orcas summer league team since age 4 and the Bayou Barracudas year-round swim team since age 7.

She came in second overall at the summer league championships in Larose last month for the girls’ 11-12 group.

All the traveling the Bradleys have done for tournaments and swim meets has brought Gabby in contact with some high-profile athletes.

“I met Paula Creamer when I was really little,” she said. “In swimming, I met a lot of Olympians – Rowdy Gaines and Aaron Perisol. I got to work with the American Olympic coaches at Auburn and LSU and the Australian Olympic coaches. That was really cool.”

To accommodate her busy schedule, Gabrielle is home-schooled. She also does e-learning through K12 Inc. Virtual Academy a couple of days a week.

“It’s fun because my mom (Patti) is my teacher,” she said. “You can bring your laptop and there’s school. You have your teacher with you, your school with you, everything.”

“That’s been excellent. It’s like a 5-to-1 teacher ratio,” Rob Bradley said. “It’s a great environment for athletes.”

Gabrielle wants to play on the LPGA Tour one day like her favorite golfer Natalie Gulbis. “That’s my goal. I’ll just play my best and hope that’s the outcome,” she said.

Rob Bradley promises to not push his daughter into more competition than she could handle.

That plan could change, however, if Gabrielle continues her recent streak of reaching milestones. Last week, she finally beat her dad in a nine-hole putting contest.

“That little bugger went one-under and beat me,” said Rob. “I thought it would be much later, like 18 or 19. Not at 11.”

Golf Runs in the Genes

Brennan also got his first set of clubs at age 3. In the three years – with no formal training – he’s acquired a knack for the game.

“He practices every day in the backyard,” said his father, Craig Hamner, who is the golf coach at Terrebonne High School. “I don’t even go out there with him unless he wants me to because I don’t want to push it on him. He’ll putt in the house and outside. I thought he had some ability, so we started working from there.”

Brennan played a few events on last year’s tour. This year, he was in all eight U.S. Golf Kids events and shot a season low of 38.

“His season average was in the 39 to 40 range,” Craig Hamner said.

Brennan’s advantage is his long drive off the tee, according to his father. His putting and chipping around the greens are just starting to come around.

“Most kids at his age hit a driver 80- to 100 yards long. Brennan was in the 130-yard range,” Craig Hamner said. “For a lot of those kids, it’s difficult to even hit a golf ball. He’ll stand there all day and not miss one. That was the thing that led me to believe he might be able to do a little something with it.”

The Hamners only get out to the golf course two to three days a week, either at Ellendale or Southern Oaks.

Brennan would prefer to be on the course every day, his father said.

Even at such a young age, he apparently is also smart enough to spot talent on TV, too.

“He loves Tiger Woods,” Craig Hamner said of his son. “He likes Phil Mickelson too. He can sit there and tell you most of them.”

Brennan Hamner, 6, and Gabrielle Bradley, 11, won their respective age groups at a nine-hole U.S. Kids Golf match in June. * Photo courtesy of ROB BRADLEY