I am looking to fly to Vegas from DC area in March. I will be taking golf clubs out there. I found a flight leaving DCA at around 7am getting to LAX at 10:30AM and then connecting flight to LAS at 5PM.

I have 2 questions:

1) will be golf clubs be okay with staying around for roughly 6 hours during that connection?
2) Am I allowed to leave LAX and meet up with a friend for a few hours and then go back? I think that answer is yes, but never done it so want to make sure