Bédard represented Canada in Davis Cup play for many years, reaching North America Zone and Interzone Finals in 1953, 1955, and 1959.
[4] His best showing at a Grand Slam event was reaching the round of 32, which he did once at both Roland Garros and Wimbledon, both in 1954, and four times at Forest Hills, in 1955, 1956, 1959, and in 1961.
1 players of 21 different countries, including Australia (Adrian Quist, Roy Emerson), the U.S. (Whitney Reed, Dick Savitt), Great Britain (Bobby Wilson, Mike Sangster), Canada (Lorne Main, Henri Rochon, Don McCormick, Jim Boyce), Italy (Nicola Pietrangeli, Orlando Sirola), Sweden (Sven Davidson, Ulf Schmidt), France (Paul Rémy, Pierre Darmon), Germany (Rupert Huber), Belgium (Jacques Brichant), Denmark (Kurt Nielsen, Torben Ulrich), Mexico (Mario Llamas, Rafael Osuna), Guatemala (Juan Jose Hermosilla), Cuba (Reynaldo Garrido), Brazil (Armando Vieira), Ecuador (Eduardo Zuleta), Uruguay (Eduardo Argon), South Africa (Gordon Forbes, Bob Mark), Rhodesia (Adrian Bey[5]), India (Ramanathan Krishnan), Viet Nam (Christian Duxin), Philippines (Willie Hernández).
1 in the U.S.. During the 1952–53 school year, Bédard attended UCLA on a tennis scholarship provided by his home community supporters in Sherbrooke, Quebec.
Fred Perry, who covered Wimbledon for BBC, stated that Bédard was the most complete athlete in the tournament and noted his competitive zeal in matches.
In European play, Bédard won a close five-set match against Orlando Sirola in the second round of the Italian Championships.
[16] As defending champion in the 1956 Canadian Open, held in Vancouver on grass, Bédard lost in the semifinals to Noel Brown, who then defeated Fontana in the final.
Bédard again reached the third round at Forest Hills, this time bowing out to unseeded American Hugh Stewart in four sets.
Bédard won the Adirondack Invitation tournament at Schroon Lake, New York,[21] defeating his fellow Canadian Davis Cup teammate Lorne Main in the final.
In August, Bédard won the Quebec Open title beating Val Harit in the final in five sets, his 100th straight victory against Canadian players.
[2] Bédard also won the 1959 Adirondack Invitation at Schroon Lake, New York defeating American players George Ball[23] in the semifinal and Sidney Schwartz in the final.
Bédard won the Quebec Open in August, beating Cuban Reynaldo Garrido in a five-set semifinal and Eduardo Zuleta of Ecuador in the final in three straight sets.
[25][26] In 1960, Bédard won the USLTA Eastern Clay Court Championships held that year at the Oritani Field Club in Hackensack, New Jersey in his only appearance at the historic tournament.
The event moved around the New York City area and included such venues as the Westchester Country Club (currently HarTru clay courts).
[42] The following week he successfully defended his Oakville Invitational title, defeating Val Harit, John Powless, and Godbout in the final.
Bédard won the Canadian National outdoor singles championship in 2006 for Age 70 players, defeating Crichton Wilson in the final.
[54] In 2015, Bédard participated with another Pan American Games medalist in a doubles match at a museum house which contained early tennis equipment.
The tie was chosen by the Canadian Davis Cup Association to be played in Montreal at the Mount Royal Tennis Club, on grass, even though both Bédard and Main were outstanding on clay.
In the 1956 Davis Cup, Canada again opened with a win over the West Indies, this time in Port of Spain on clay courts, the Canadians' most successful surface, and dropping only one set.
Bédard lost a dead rubber to Richardson in straight sets and Paul Willey gave the Canadians some consolation in winning the fifth match over MacKay.
Canada started the 1958 campaign superbly, playing at home on clay in Toronto, sweeping aside Cuba without conceding more than 4 games in any set.
The Canadian Davis Cup Association selected a grass surface to host the tie, although Bédard was a clay specialist.
[67] His playing style was described by Lucien Laverdure, a racket ace also inducted into the Quebec Sports Hall of Fame in 1991, in his book "Tennis Mon Obsession", published around 1965: "[Bédard's] dominant qualities of determination, patience, strength, control, combined with an extraordinary sense of anticipation led him straight to the goal he had set for himself and far beyond".
It is through perseverance and motivation that Robert Bédard will succeed in triumphing in tennis: he will never have enough time to perfect his technique and bring it up to the level of European or American players who were training at the year long.
A bit like Rafael Nadal, Bédard excelled more on clay and exhausted his opponents: I am not comparing his level of play here to that of the Spaniard but rather trying to highlight his qualities as a player.
"[12] Laverdure further referenced that "Raymond Summers, a Toronto journalist wrote (1956) that it would have been better for [Bédard] to spend a few seasons working on his shots than to engage in international competitions, referring to a lack of technique to deal with this elite level.
In short, we can conclude that Robert Bédard played instinctively and that he was above all motivated by his desire to win; if he had had the chance to perfect his basic skills, he could have performed at another level and who knows, reached heights that Canadian players still dream of.
Bédard was a tennis colour commentator for coverage of a round robin tournament held in Canada in 1967 and again in 1968, that featured four of the world's top amateur players.
An amateur tennis player in the days before Open tennis, Bédard has been a long-time educator, first as a French and geography school teacher at Bishop's College School in Sherbrooke, Quebec and as longtime headmaster (principal) for 16 years at St. Andrew's College in Aurora, Ontario where he and his wife Anne still live.
One of Bédard's near neighbours in Aurora was his former Davis Cup team-mate Lorne Main, who lived in an adjacent town about 15 minutes drive away.