Here we are. Chris Stroud, Texas boy.

Here I am.

Born and raised in Texas.

Yes, sir.

Where exactly?

So I grew up in a little town called Groves, Texas. A lot of people don't know it. We call it Mid County or Golden Triangle. It's about an hour and a half straight east of Houston, right off I-10. Beaumont's the big city. We' always tell people that when I would travel around the world, where I'm from, I say it's about an hour outside of Houston. I went to a little high school called Port Neches Groves, one of the best football programs in the state.

That's where you started.

That's where I started.

What was that like? When did you start golf?

I started playing, my first tournament, I was nine years old. I played the nine and 10-year-old bracket. I played nine holes. I actually got in a playoff and lost. Probably the best thing that ever happened to me.

You were there. Who took you out there? Were you with family?

My dad's side of the family, they all grew up playing golf, and I played baseball, basketball, football, golf, soccer, swam. I did everything in the summer, but when I was two years old I had a fake golf club, you know, little plastic golf club set. My dad was, he was pretty excited about it. He wanted me to play golf because he loved golf himself. And little did they know that they sparked a little fire in me, and I started playing golf my first tournament when I was nine years old.

And I started playing baseball and basketball and football when I was about five or six, peewee leagues and church basketball and stuff like that. I played baseball all the way til ninth grade. And when I got into ninth grade, I hurt myself in eighth and ninth grade in my knee. And it kind of forced me out of the other sports, and my parents always said that golf was my best sport. I felt like baseball might've been my best sport, but I just started losing the love for the team game, and golf was this individual, the toughest, as we all know. And it was the most mentally challenging game, and here I am today.

What kind of course did you grow up on? And did it have-- I can imagine because I'm from Texas. I live here now myself, so was it a small country type course?

It's funny, I grew up-- The nickname for it's called the pea patch, nine-hole course, really was a bar with nine holes behind it. And it really wasn't even nine holes. It was one square block, a big drainage ditch all the way around.

Obviously no driving range or anything like that.

Very little drive, I mean really no driving range. They would create par fours with OB stakes, so it was really just a straight hole. They'd make OB stakes, you got a par four.

In course, out of bounds.

Yeah, exactly. In course, out of bounds. USGA would not like that.