Background and career
Kyle Troup (born June 11, 1991) is an American professional ten-pin bowler originally from Taylorsville, North Carolina. He uses the two-handed shovel-style delivery with a dominant right hand. Troup says he needed two hands when learning to throw the ball as a young child, calling himself self-taught in that regard. His father is PBA Hall of Famer Guppy Troup. Troup has been a member of the Professional Bowlers Association (PBA) since 2008, and began competing full-time on the PBA Tour in 2015. He won his first national PBA Tour title at the 2015 PBA Wolf Open and has twelve PBA Tour titles to date, including two major championships and two wins in the PBA Playoffs. Since 2018, Troup also competes internationally as a member of Team USA. With his $100,000 win at the PBA Playoffs on May 16, 2021, Troup set the PBA's single-season earnings record with $469,200, surpassing the $419,700 earned by Walter Ray Williams Jr. in the 2002–03 season. Troup would finish the 2021 season with $496,900 in earnings. At the PBA Tour Finals on June 5, 2022, Troup bowled the 33rd televised 300 game in PBA Tour history. Troup is a member of the Storm and Vise Grips pro staffs.
Troup, a Taylorsville, North Carolina native, was one of the youngest-ever members of the North Carolina All Stars team, bowling in events across North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia as a teenager. On January 7, 2018, Troup finished as the top qualifier at the United States Bowling Congress Team USA Trials, making the team for the first time in his career. At the 2018 World Bowling Tour Men's Championships in Hong Kong (held November 24–December 5), he won a gold medal in trios with teammates Andrew Anderson and E. J. Tackett. Troup and his Team USA teammates won the 2019 Weber Cup over Team Europe. Troup bowled in ten matches over the 32-match event, going 5–0 in singles, 0–3 in doubles, and 1–1 in team. In the 2020 Weber Cup, Troup and Team USA again defeated Team Europe, 23–18. Overall in the 2020 event, Troup participated in 14 of 41 matches, going 3–3 in singles, 2–4 in doubles, and 1–1 in team. At the 2021 Weber Cup, the USA was defeated by Team Europe, 18–17. Troup participated in 10 of 35 matches, going 0–4 in singles, 2–0 in doubles, and 0–3 in team.
Said to be one of the PBA's premier two-handed bowlers, Troup sometimes uses an older-technology urethane bowling ball on shorter oil patterns. Troup has made 34 PBA championship round appearances through the 2025 season, and owns 15 PBA Regional titles. He has rolled 16 career 300 games in PBA competition through July 2020.
Troup spent his first five years as a PBA member bowling mostly in PBA Regional Tour events close to home, while he worked his regular job managing a Wendy's restaurant. He won his first Regional title at age 19 in the 2010 Fort Jackson (SC) Non-Champion Regional. He was named PBA Southern Region Player of the Year in both 2013 and 2014.
In 2015, Troup decided to bowl more events on the national PBA Tour, and made it to the championship round (the final stage of a PBA tournament) four times. He won the 2015 PBA Wolf Open in Shawnee, Oklahoma for his first PBA Tour title. He finished eighth in the South Shore PBA/PBA50 doubles with PBA50 player Jerry Brunette Jr.
In 2016, Troup finished second in the Downums Waste Services Xtra Frame Open, and fourth in the Gene Carter's Pro Shop Classic.
