Marty Dou is 26 years old and is looking to win on the PGA Tour, contending in the final round of the 2023 AT&T Byron Nelson.
However, most people didn't know Marty Dou as that name when he made his debut on the PGA Tour. Instead, they knew him by his given name, Zecheng Dou. In fact, he is listed as Zecheng Dou in the Official World Golf Ranking.
So why does the PGA Tour, golf announcers and the player himself refer to him as Marty Dou?
Why does pro golfer Zecheng Dou call himself Marty Dou?
Zecheng Dou calls himself Marty Dou because of how a teacher addressed him when he grew up in Canada.
Dou's family came to North America from China, and they settled initially in Vancouver, in British Columbia.
When Dou's kindergarten teacher asked him his name, he, of course, replied with his given name. However, it turned out that the teacher wasn't able or wasn't willing to address him properly.
"I don't know. Like she was like, do you want the name Marty? Like Chinese name was too hard, yeah," Dou said after the third round of the tournament at TPC Craig Ranch in McKinney, Texas, which is where he lives now.
Dou loves Dallas for a variety of reasons, but some of it comes back to his Chinese roots.
"Then the city (Dallas) is major because playing on the Korn Ferry back then it was easy travel everywhere and it has direct flights to China, which I often go back," he said.
"There is great Chinese food, so everything kind of fits me here. It's a great city, too."
