Kamel Guessoum

HISTORY

Born in North Africa, Kamel Guessoum was born to a large family of modest circumstances.  Kamel begin playing soccer at nine years old and when he was sixteen he moved to Limoges France to play professionally for the Limoges Football Club. When Kamel was injured during a soccer match he was unable to continue his professional soccer career and returned to Morocco and took up tennis with the Morocco tennis team and participated in the Championship Tennis Tour of Morocco.

In 1979 Kamel began studying to be a certified professional tennis coach. Kamel was tested on both his written and court competence at the Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Bradenton Florida in 1980 and was certified as a USPTA Tennis Professional.

In 1981 Kamel moved to the island Cayenne in the French Caribbean and become the head coach of the French Caribbean Tennis Team. Kamel prepared the team to compete in the Caribbean Inter-island Championship. Under Kamel’s leadership, the team won the championship in 1985.

In 1986 Kamel received an offer from the Royal Tennis Federation of Morocco to coach the junior Moroccan national team for the Mediterranean games. Kamel accepted this position and was the Coach of the team until 1990

In 1991 Kamel accepted a coaching position at the prestigious Sofia Antipolice Academy near Nice, France where he became responsible for coaching the leading French junior players including Sebastian Grosjean who achieved a world ranking of number four in1997.

In 1995 Kamel moved to Florida to work with the West Palm Beach Junior Academy and began coaching top junior players Southern Florida.  One of Kamel’s students was Vince Spadia whom Kamel coached from 15 until 18 and prepared him for his pro career. Vince achieved a world ranking of 15 and was also a valuable member of the USA Davis Cup Team.

In 1999 Kamel returned to Morocco where he worked in Tangiers coaching leading Moroccan Junior players including Arafat Chekrouni who competed and reached the quarter finals of the Roland Garros Junior Grand Slam.

In 2006 Kamel came to San Diego to be near his son Karim who is commercial airline pilot. In San Diego Kamel worked at the Barnes Tennis Center coaching in the junior program with Lorenzo Conan.

TODAY

Kamel works with top junior players in the San Diego area as well as with the Rancho Santa Fe Tennis Club, coaching the junior player program.

Kamel continues his professional tennis growth by attending four USPTA World Conferences every year and were he makes certain his coaching skills are the most up to date and current in professional tennis coaching. While in attendance he takes the time to consult with many of the leading tennis professional in the word including Stan Smith, Nick Bollettieri, Andre Agassi, Patrick McEnroe, Tim  Heckler as well as many others.

In October 2008 Kamel was selected to be an ambassador of the USPTA and has taken on the role of promoting junior tennis though out Southern California.