Bob Carmichael

Bob Carmichael, a former tennis player and coach of Pat Rafter and Indian doubles specialist Leander Paes, died on November 18 at the age of 63.

Carmichael, a former carpenter and boxer, started his tennis career in the early 1960s and later based himself in Versailles, France, to pursue the growing European professional circuit.

A founding member of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP), he reached the quarterfinals of Wimbledon in singles, doubles and mixed doubles in 1970 when he achieved a top 10 ranking in singles.

In 1979, his last year on the circuit, he was a doubles semifinalist at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. The righthander was also a singles finalist at the Paris Indoor in 1968 and at Sacramento, California in 1976.

Carmichael later coached Rafter and helped with the early careers of former world No. 1 Lleyton Hewitt and fellow Australian pro Darren Cahill.

More recently, he coached leading doubles specialist Paes, including in 1999 when Paes and partner Mahesh Bhupathi won three of the four Grand Slam doubles titles.

Carmichael, who also worked with Tennis Australia and the Australian Institute of Sport as a coach, is survived by his wife, Teresa, and seven-year-old son Lewis.