Braless golf influencer Paige Spiranac has a doppelganger coming for her crown… and she or he’s turning up the warmth

Grace Charis doesn’t remember which post started it all off. 

But she can easily recall the ‘addiction’ she got from seeing her racy golf content explode across social media.

‘It was kind of like a chain reaction, one would go off and then the next one and the next one,’ she tells the Daily Mail from Stonebridge Ranch Country Club in Texas.

‘I was just so excited that something was working. It was like “Oh shoot. This is so fun.” It’s kind of addicting to see the numbers come in and I liked it.’

Charis, who is originally from Newport Beach in California, was relatively late to the golf/social-media scene in comparison to Paige Spiranac, the space’s biggest female star.

But having only emerged to prominence in 2023, the 22-year-old has nonetheless managed to build an impressive audience and vastly improve her game in a short time.

Charis, who plays four or five times a week and has a handicap of just five, boasts just under four million followers on Instagram, three million on TikTok and 1.5million on YouTube. 

One video of her playing golf with members of the wildly popular Good Good channel has amassed 2.3 million views. In other words, she’s becoming a serious force.

Of course, it is easy to make comparisons between Spiranac, 32, and Charis thanks to their shared love of braless pictures, slow-motion swings and raunchy outfits.

And it may not be such a coincidence. Charis was once happy to admit that golf was not her main priority, and that she was instead focused on ‘trying to get views’.

However, speaking exclusively to Charis today, she is keen to play down the Spiranac comparisons and even suggests she knows little about her would-be rival.

‘I get compared to her a lot, but I don’t know much of her stuff. It doesn’t come up on my feed, either,’ she says, in what could be perceived as a subtle dig. 

‘So I don’t know too much about what she does, but she seems nice. She seems like she’s a good golfer, too. I think that’s good for everybody, to be good at the sport and promote the sport. It’s kind of the goal.’

Asked about a noticeable recent shift in her content from risque posts to more golf-focused videos, Charis says: ‘I think it just has to do with, like, when I started social media I wasn’t necessarily a golfer. So watching that grow over time and me getting more into golf, it’s kind of reflected in what I post and stuff. I’m diving pretty hard into the actual game more right now.’

But that’s not to say that she isn’t aware of the attention she garners. 

‘Sometimes people aren’t there for the golf game and they’re there just because I’m a pretty face or something,’ she says. ‘But they’re still getting exposed to the game. I think at the end of the day, no matter what, the game of golf is still getting pushed, which is kind of what I want to share with people – my love for the game.’

Charis’s trajectory seems all the more remarkable when you consider that just five years ago she was preparing for a season as a college rower, only for her dreams to be sunk by Covid-19.

With her opportunity lost to the pandemic, friends encouraged her to turn to golf when the world emerged from the misery of lockdown. 

‘I was in this really good, athletic space. What am I supposed to do? It [rowing] literally ended in one day. I had to pick up another sport,’ she says. ‘So I started golfing and surfing more. I had some friends that played and they kind of just were like “Hey, you want to come to the range?”

‘It was that group that I was in and the friends I was close with who got me into it. It’s how I picked it up and then I guess I just started making videos and did well so I kept doing that.’

Certainly, it hasn’t always been a smooth journey. 

As ever when somebody emerges onto the golf scene, a place often resistant to anything challenging the status quo, there are critics waiting to attack.

‘It doesn’t really bother me because I’m just having fun and I’m doing what I love and just having a good time out there,’ says Charis.

‘A lot of people have been super nice to me. So I guess when dealing with the critics, because the criticism is mostly online, I think you learn to not read the comments or take it to heart. In the beginning it was really hard [playing golf on camera] because you don’t want to show everyone the times that you suck. 

‘But it’s almost important to show everyone that no matter what happens, you’ve just got to keep going… I think getting over that fear of people judging you was important part of my growth.

‘Now it’s fun to show bad rounds and good rounds. Even if you have a bad moment, you don’t know, the next moment could be good too. So I think there’s just a lot of growing involved in that.’

None other than pro legend Rory McIlroy launched a scathing attack on YouTube golfers like Charis earlier this year, calling them ‘entertainment adjacent’ and suggesting they are contributing to a oversaturation of the sport.

But Charis bites back.

‘I think it’s great to expand the accessibility to learning… for people like me. At the very beginning, I didn’t really have access to great teachers or knowledge to golf and [it helped] having it on YouTube where the pros are the ones teaching you, learning from the best is great for the community,’ she says.

It’s not lost on Charis that while Kai Trump – the 17-year-old granddaughter of the president – is the newest member of the burgeoning golf/social-media community and yet her obvious connections have allowed her to collaborate with the likes of McIlroy.

At last week’s prestigious Junior Invitational in South Carolina, Kai had a huge crowd of young fans following her every move despite enduring a nightmare on the course.

Charis is not at all surprised by the Trump impact and is full of praise for the example the president’s granddaughter is setting for young female fans.

‘She’s a really good golfer. Her swing is technically amazing. So I’m a fan of what she’s doing in the space,’ Charis says. ‘I think it’s great for the game. It was cool to see her compete at such a high level, too. I think it’s good for young girls and stuff to be exposed to other women that are doing that.’

Perhaps Charis and Kai will collaborate one day. But when asked who her dream playing partner would be, she doesn’t hesitate: ‘I love Nelly Korda. I think playing in a one-v-one or something would be amazing. To play with a female golfer that’s really, really good, and someone who’s won a bunch of stuff, so Nelly is up there for sure. Maybe Lydia Ko, too.’ 

And how about anyone in the YouTube space?

‘I’ve been watching Grant Horvat a lot, actually, because he’s been doing a lot of stuff with actual pro golfers.

‘I find it a really good learning experience to hear the pros talk and interact with someone like Grant. He asks the right questions so I think I can learn a lot by just watching his videos about golf.’

And what does the future look like for Charis? 

‘I have a lot of golf tournaments coming up: the US Open qualifier, the Texas Amateur and some Wagner events,’ she says.

‘But I’m also putting out a new [apparel] brand. I think pushing or putting out a company that shows something I love about the game and encouraging other people to be part of it is, it’s super exciting for me to be able to be creative and show that.’

If the trajectory of Charis’s career so far is anything to go by then picking up a golf club could be the best thing she’s ever done.