He was also a qualified chemical engineer and president of Swiss Timing, a company specialising in sports chronometry which is now part of the Swatch group.
As a student, Keller was a member of the Swiss university teams for Nordic combined skiing and for ski-jumping.
However, in rowing, he was not only a champion sculler at Swiss national level, but won the bronze medal in single sculls at the 1950 European Rowing Championships.Keller was chosen to row at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, but did not do so as his national Olympic Committee chose to boycott the games in protest at the Soviet Union's invasion of Hungary (see 1956 Hungarian Revolution).
Two years later, he became president of FISA, following the death of the previous president, Gaston Mullegg.
At 34, he was one of the youngest presidents of an international sports federation ever to be elected.
Keller always aimed to give priority to athletes' interests, and consistently aimed to minimize the influence of politics on sport.The Thomas Keller Medal is named after him.
It is presented by FISA to recently retired rowers who had had an outstanding international career.Thomas Keller was married to Dorry Bodmer of Zurich, Switzerland.
They had five children: Dominik, Adrian, Bettina, Anne and Barbara Keller.