Mahesh Shrinivas Bhupathi (born 7 June 1974) is an Indian former doubles world No. 1

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cov ...

player. In 1997, he became the first Indian to win a

major Major ( commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicato ...

tournament (with

Rika Hiraki Rika Hiraki ( ja, 平木理化, born 6 December 1971) is a former professional Japanese tennis player. She won the mixed-doubles title at the 1997 French Open (with Mahesh Bhupathi Mahesh Shrinivas Bhupathi (born 7 June 1974) is an Indi ...

). With his win at the 2006 Australian Open mixed doubles, he joined the elite group of eight tennis players who have achieved a career Grand Slam in mixed doubles. He is also the founder of

International Premier Tennis League The International Premier Tennis League (IPTL, officially the Coca-Cola International Premier Tennis League Presented by Qatar Airways pursuant to sponsorship agreements with The Coca-Cola Company and Qatar Airways) was an annual team tennis leag ...

. In December 2016, Bhupathi was appointed as India's next non-playing

Davis Cup The Davis Cup is the premier international team event in men's tennis. It is run by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and is contested annually between teams from competing countries in a knock-out format. It is described by the organi ...

captain and took over the reins from Anand Amritraj in February 2017.

Career

1995–2006

Mahesh Bhupathi is considered one of the top doubles players of the 1990s and 2000s. In 1999, Bhupathi won three doubles titles with Leander Paes, including the

French Open The French Open (french: Internationaux de France de tennis), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each year. The tournament and ve ...

and Wimbledon. He and Paes became the first doubles team to reach the finals of all four Grand Slams, the first time such a feat has been achieved in the open era and the first time since 1952. On 26 April of that year, they became the world no. 1 doubles team. Bhupathi also won the US Open

mixed doubles Mixed doubles or mixed pairs is a form of mixed-sex sports that consists of teams of one man and one woman. This variation of competition is prominent in curling and racket sports, such as tennis, table tennis and badminton (where it is known ...

with Ai Sugiyama of Japan. In 2006, Bhupathi teamed with Martina Hingis in the Australian Open mixed doubles competition. Entering the tournament unseeded and as wildcards, the first-time pair defeated four seeded opponents along the way, while only dropping a single set throughout. Bhupathi and Hingis defeated the sixth-seeded team of

Daniel Nestor Daniel Mark Nestor ( ; sr, Данијел Нестор, Danijel Nestor; born September 4, 1972) is a Canadian former professional tennis player. Nestor won 91 men's doubles titles (with 11 different partners), including an Olympic gold medal a ...

and

Elena Likhovtseva Elena Alexandrovna Likhovtseva (russian: Елена Александровна Лиховцева ; born 8 September 1975) is a Kazakhstani-born Russian former tennis player. She turned professional in January 1992, at the age of 16. Together ...

in straight sets, 6–3, 6–3, to capture the championship. It was the sixth mixed doubles Grand Slam for Bhupathi, and the first one for Hingis. By winning the Australian Open, Bhupathi completed a career Grand Slam in mixed doubles.

2007–2008

In 2007, Bhupathi and

Radek Štěpánek Radek Štěpánek (; born 27 November 1978) is a Czech former professional tennis player. His career-high singles ranking was world No. 8 and best doubles ranking was world No. 4. Štěpánek's biggest achievements are reaching two Masters 10 ...

reached the

2007 Australian Open The 2007 Australian Open was a Grand Slam tennis tournament held in Melbourne, Australia from 15 January until 28 January 2007. The total prize pool was set at exactly A$20 million, with the winners of both the men's and women's singles competi ...

men's doubles event's quarterfinals. Bhupathi teamed with Štěpánek at the

2007 French Open The 2007 French Open (Roland Garros) was held in Paris, France from 27 May through to 10 June 2007. Rafael Nadal became the first man to win the tournament 3 times consecutively since Björn Borg, 1978–81; and maintained his unbeaten run at Rol ...

to make the

doubles Men's doubles, Women's doubles or Mixed doubles are sports having two players per side, including; * Beach volleyball * Doubles badminton * Doubles curling * Footvolley * Doubles pickleball * Doubles squash * Doubles table tennis * Doubles te ...

semifinals, defeating two-year defending champions Jonas Björkman and

Max Mirnyi Maksim "Max" Mikalaevich Mirnyi ( be, Максім Мікалаевіч Мірны, ; russian: Максим Николаевич Мирный, ; born 6 July 1977) is a Belarusian former professional tennis player. Mirnyi became a doubles spec ...

in the quarterfinals. The team lost to the eventual champions Mark Knowles and

. After Wimbledon, Bhupathi teamed with

Pavel Vízner Pavel Vízner (born 15 July 1970) is a retired professional male tennis player from the Czech Republic. Vízner has reached the French Open final twice, having had turned professional in 1990 and achieved a career high doubles ranking of World ...

to win the 2007 Canada Masters, defeating the top-ranked doubles team Bob and

Mike Bryan Michael Carl Bryan (born April 29, 1978) is an American former doubles world No. 1 tennis player. With his twin brother Bob, he was the world's top doubles player for more than nine years, first achieving the top ranking in Septem ...

en route. After this victory, he won a tournament in

New Haven New Haven is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound in New Haven County, Connecticut and is part of the New York City metropolitan area. With a population of 134,023 ...

with Nenad Zimonjić. At the 2007 US Open, he and Zimonjić paired in

. After the US Open, the team that beat Bhupathi and Štěpánek in the French Open semifinals, Knowles and Nestor, split up. Bhupathi became Knowles' partner, while Zimonjić became Nestor's, but back surgery meant he was out until the end of the year.

2009–2012

In 2009, Bhupathi and compatriot

Sania Mirza Sania Mirza (; born 15 November 1986) is an Indian professional tennis player. A former doubles world No. 1, she has won six major titles – three in women's doubles and three in mixed doubles. From 2003 until her retirement from singles ...

won the mixed doubles title at the Australian Open, beating Nathalie Dechy and

Andy Ram Andreas "Andy" Ram ( he, אנדי רם; born April 10, 1980) is a retired Israeli professional tennis player. He was primarily a doubles player, and competed in three Olympics. He is the first Israeli tennis player to win a senior Grand Slam ...

, 6–3, 6–1, in the final. The Indian pair thus made up for the disappointment of the previous year's final when they were beaten by

Sun Tiantian Sun Tiantian (; ; born 12 October 1981) is a Chinese former professional tennis player. She won the gold medal at the 2004 Summer Olympics in women's doubles along with her partner Li Ting. Sun reached a career-high singles ranking of worl ...

and Nenad Zimonjić. With this win, Bhupathi's count in mixed doubles Grand Slam titles increased to seven. Bhupathi broke up his partnership with Knowles and began playing once again with

, with whom he played to win the 2002 US Open. In 2011, Bhupathi reunited with former playing partner Leander Paes for the

2011 Australian Open The 2011 Australian Open was a tennis tournament featuring six different competitions, and part of the 2011 ATP World Tour, the 2011 WTA Tour, ITF Junior Tour and the NEC Tour, as tournaments for professional, junior and wheelchair players were ...

. The team reached the final, but lost 3–6, 4–6 to the Bryan brothers. On 7 June 2012, Bhupathi and

won the French Open mixed doubles. On 4 November 2012, Bhupathi and partner Rohan Bopanna won the Paris Masters cup. In spite of suffering a setback with their loss against Jonathan Marray and

Frederik Nielsen Frederik Løchte Nielsen (born 27 August 1983) is a former professional tennis player. He was the top ranked player from Denmark in the ATP doubles world rankings. A former Wimbledon men's doubles champion, he peaked at no. 17 in the rankin ...

in the ATP Tour Finals opener, the Indian duo reached the final round of the ATP Tour Finals, but suffered a defeat at the hands of

Marcel Granollers Marcel Granollers Pujol (; ; born 12 April 1986) is a Spanish professional tennis player. He reached his career-high singles ranking of world No. 19 in July 2012, and his career-high doubles ranking of world No. 4 in February 2013. Granollers h ...

and

Marc López Marc López Tarrés (, ; born 31 July 1982) is a Spanish retired professional tennis player and coach. His career-high ATP singles ranking was world No. 106 (May 2004) and world No. 3 in doubles (January 2013). Partnering Feliciano López, ...

Mahesh Bhupathi and Mark Knowles-2010-01-02

2013

Bhupathi and Bopanna played with different partners for the first three months of 2013, Bhupathi winning the tournament in Dubai in March with

Michaël Llodra Michaël Llodra (; born 18 May 1980) is a French former professional tennis player. He was a successful doubles player with three Grand Slam championships and an Olympic silver medal, and has also had success in singles, winning five career titl ...

, but rejoined starting with the Monte-Carlo Masters.

Early life

Mahesh Shrinivas Bhupathi was born on 07 June 1974 in a

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode ...

family in Chennai, India.

Playing style

Mahesh Bhupathi is known for his big serve. According to Nadal, his strong backhand makes him the best for an Ad Court player. Roger Federer acclaims him as one of the best players of all time. He often discusses strategies between the serves with his partner during the match and also communicates using finger-at-the-back signals.

Year-end finals

Bhupathi appeared with Paes in six season finales. In 2011, they appeared, for the first time since 2002, after securing qualification in mid-October. Bhupathi played at the year-end championships with Paes from 1997 to 2000 and in 2002, reaching three finals. In 1997, they lost the final to Rick Leach and Jonathan Stark. They lost the 1999 final to Sébastien Lareau and Alex O’Brien. In 2000, they lost the final to Donald Johnson and Pieter Norval. Bhupathi also qualified with

in 2003, 2004, and 2010, when they finished runners-up to

and Nenad Zimonjić. He appeared at the finals with Mark Knowles in 2008 and 2009. In 2012, he and Rohan Bopanna made it to the final, where they lost to

and

Significant finals

Grand Slam tournament finals

Doubles: 10 (4 titles, 6 runner-ups)

Mixed doubles: 12 (8 titles, 4 runner-ups)

By winning the 2006 Australian Open title, Bhupathi completed the mixed doubles Career Grand Slam. He became the eighth male player in history to achieve this.

Olympic medal matches

Doubles: 1 (1 fourth place)

ATP career finals

Doubles: 96 (52–44)

Performance timelines

Doubles

Mixed doubles

Davis Cup and Asian Games

Bhupathi has donned Indian colours numerous times for the

as well as other international tournaments, including the

Asian Games The Asian Games, also known as Asiad, is a continental multi-sport event held every four years among athletes from all over Asia. The Games were regulated by the Asian Games Federation (AGF) from the first Games in New Delhi, India, until t ...

. Bhupathi has played 55 matches for India in the Davis Cup (from 1995 to 2011), winning 35 and losing 20. Out of the 35 matches that he won, 27 of his victories came in doubles matches. In 2006, Bhupathi won the doubles championship with Leander Paes at the Asian Games in Doha.

Personal life

In 2001, he was awarded the

Padma Shri Padma Shri ( IAST: ''padma śrī''), also spelled Padma Shree, is the fourth-highest civilian award of the Republic of India, after the Bharat Ratna, the Padma Vibhushan and the Padma Bhushan. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conf ...

, one of India's highest civilian awards. Bhupathi is an alumnus of the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi ( byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment ...

in the United States. He is the founder of Globosport India private Limited which he started in 2002 as a sports and entertainment agency. He married model

Shvetha Jaishankar Shvetha Jaishankar (born 11 December 1978) is an Indian model, author, entrepreneur, beauty pageant titleholder, writer, and a trained Bharatanatyam dancer. She won the title at the Femina Miss India International 1998 and later was crowned as ...

in 2002 but the couple got divorced in 2009 after seven years of marriage. He then married Miss Universe 2000 Lara Dutta in a civil ceremony on 16 February 2011 at

Bandra Bandra ( æːɳɖɾa also known as Vandre ( �aːn̪d̪ɾe is an upscale coastal suburb located in Mumbai (Bombay) area of the Konkan division, Maharashtra, India. The suburb is located to the immediate north of River Mithi, which separates B ...

Mumbai Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the secon ...

. It was followed by a Christian ceremony on 20 February 2011 at Sunset Point in Goa. On 1 August 2011, Dutta confirmed that she was pregnant with their first child. Their daughter Saira was born on 20 January 2012. In 2010, the couple started a film production company, Big Daddy Productions. In 2014, Mahesh Bhupathi launched an authentic Indian sports brand, ZEVEN. The company currently endorses

Ravindra Jadeja Ravindrasinh Anirudhsinh Jadeja (born 6 December 1988), commonly known as Ravindra Jadeja, is an Indian international cricketer. He is an all-rounder, who bats left-handed and bowls left-arm orthodox spin. He was the captain of the Chennai Su ...

, Rohan Bopanna, Shikhar Dhawan and

Mary Kom Mangte Chungneijang Mary Kom (born 01 March 1983) is an Indian amateur boxer, politician, and former Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha. She is the only woman to win the World Amateur Boxing Championship six times, the only female boxer to ha ...

, amongst others.

Partnerships

Partners in men's doubles

Partners in mixed doubles

*These lists only consists of players who played with Mahesh Bhupathi in ATP(& ITF)-recognized tournaments which include the

Olympics The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a vari ...

, Grand Slams, World Tour Finals, World Tour Masters, World Tour Series, Davis Cup Ties, and

ATP Challenger The ATP Challenger Tour, known until the end of 2008 as the ATP Challenger Series, is a series of international men's professional tennis tournaments. The Challenger Tour events are the second-highest tier of tennis competition, behind the ATP T ...

s. The lists might be incomplete when all the other tournaments are considered. The order of the players in the list is based on their first partnering with Mahesh Bhupathi.

Other partners

India – Asian Games/Commonwealth Games/Other Events

* Leander Paes

Partnership with Leander Paes

Bhupathi and Leander Paes partnered in the men's doubles event at the

2008 Summer Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and also known as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes from 204 Nat ...

in Beijing, but lost the quarterfinals, to

Roger Federer Roger Federer (; born 8 August 1981) is a Swiss former professional tennis player. He was ranked world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for 310 weeks, including a record 237 consecutive weeks, and finished as the year-e ...

and

Stanislas Wawrinka Stanislas "Stan" Wawrinka (; born 28 March 1985) is a Swiss professional tennis player. He reached a career-high Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) singles ranking of world No. 3 for the first time on 27 January 2014. His career highlight ...

of Switzerland, who went on to win the gold medal. Paes and Bhupathi decided to team up again at the Australian Open 2011, ending a nine-year separation on the ATP circuit. They reached the finals of the event, but lost to American twins

Bob and Mike Bryan The Bryan brothers, identical twin brothers Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan, are retired American professional doubles tennis players and the most successful duo of all time. They were born on April 29, 1978, with Mike being the elder by two minutes. ...

. Paes stated at the time that the best thing has been to have their friendship back. The Indian duo has a 303–103 career record together. They have a Davis Cup record of longest winning streak in doubles, with 23 straight wins. Leander Paes wanted to play with Mahesh Bhupathi in the men's doubles event of the London Olympics, to be held July–August 2012. On 19 June 2012, the All India Tennis association relented to the demands of Bhupathi and Bopanna of not playing along Paes. Two teams were sent for the London Olympics- 2012, with Mahesh Bhupathi and Rohan Bopanna as one team and the other team consisting of Leander Paes and Vishnu Vardhan. Bhupathi also accused AITA of using Sania Mirza as bait for Leander's participation in the Olympics. When AITA relented to the wishes of Bhupathi and Bopanna and permitted them to play together, they lost in the second round to the unseeded French pairing of

Richard Gasquet Richard Gabriel Cyr Gasquet (; born 18 June 1986) is a French professional tennis player. His career-high ATP singles ranking is world No. 7, attained on 9 July 2007. He has won a total of 15 singles titles on the ATP Tour. His best performances ...

and

Julien Benneteau Julien Henry Guy Benneteau-Desgrois (; born 20 December 1981) is a French retired professional tennis player. His career-high singles ranking is ATP world no. 25, which he reached in November 2014. He formerly resided in Boulogne-Billancourt and ...

Davis Cup Record

The duo of Bhupathi and Paes has the longest doubles streak in Davis Cup history.

Sports management and sports-based e-commerce

Bhupathi has also been involved in developing tennis facilities in India and, along with his company Globosport, has played a key rôle in developing and managing the careers of many Indian athletes, including

International Premier Tennis League

Mahesh Bhupathi announced the founding of the International Premier Tennis League on 25 May 2013, in Paris. The initial plan was to start the

league League or The League may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Leagues'' (band), an American rock band * ''The League'', an American sitcom broadcast on FX and FXX about fantasy football Sports * Sports league * Rugby league, full contact footba ...

with six charter franchises in Asia with the inaugural

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and ...

commencing in November 2014. Bhupathi said the league would be modeled after the

Indian Premier League The Indian Premier League (IPL), also known as TATA IPL for sponsorship reasons, is a men's T20 franchise cricket league of India. It is annually contested by ten teams based out of seven Indian cities and three Indian states. The leagu ...

, a

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...

league in India. Justin Gimelstob said that the league would be star-driven as World Team Tennis was in the 1970s.

In popular culture

Break Point - A documentary series of Zee5 app released in 2021 unfolding the ups and downs in the relationship between Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi.

Awards

, 2001 * Sports people for Change Karmaveer Puraskaar, 2007, iCONGO-Confederation of NGOs *

Commitment Award

Notes

References

External links

* * *
www.cmpaul.wordpress.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bhupathi, Mahesh 1974 births Living people Asian Games gold medalists for India Asian Games medalists in tennis Australian Open (tennis) champions French Open champions Indian Christians Indian male tennis players Ole Miss Rebels men's tennis players Olympic tennis players of India Racket sportspeople from Bangalore Racket sportspeople from Chennai Recipients of the Arjuna Award Recipients of the Padma Shri in sports Telugu people Tennis players at the 2004 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 2008 Summer Olympics Tennis players at the 2012 Summer Olympics US Open (tennis) champions Wimbledon champions Grand Slam (tennis) champions in mixed doubles Grand Slam (tennis) champions in men's doubles Tennis players at the 1998 Asian Games Tennis players at the 2002 Asian Games Tennis players at the 2006 Asian Games Asian Games silver medalists for India Asian Games bronze medalists for India Commonwealth Games bronze medallists for India Tennis players at the 2010 Commonwealth Games Commonwealth Games medallists in tennis Medalists at the 1998 Asian Games Medalists at the 2002 Asian Games Medalists at the 2006 Asian Games ATP number 1 ranked doubles tennis players ITF World Champions