Don Cherry may well be recognized as Mr. Hockey, but if there's anyone whose expertise, experience, promotion and love of the game parallels his in another sport, it's Stuart Robinson, a.k.a. Mr. Rugby.
Robinson eats, sleeps and breaths rugby. For more than 30 years, this dynamic 60 year-old, husband to Cheryl and father of two girls, Amy and Nancy, has been a head coach and guest coach to many local high school teams in the greater Ottawa area, developed and coached non-contact mini rugby for children and youth and founded the Barrhaven Barbarians Rugby Football Club. In 1999, Robinson was honoured for his outstanding contributions to the development of local rugby and received the Distinguished Service Award, Sports and Recreation (Rugby) for the city of Nepean. To note, Robinson coached the regional Eastern Ontario Rugby Union (EORU) U-16 and U-18 rep teams and was an assistant coach to the University of Western Ontario during a tour of New Zealand and Australia in 2001 and to the Ontario Provincial U-21 men's rep teams.
Currently, Robinson is the head coach of the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees men's rugby club. He also holds posts with the Ottawa Indians Rugby Football Club as a youth development officer and in player recruitment. His long and tumulus love affair with the sport begun many years ago at the young age of 10 in England at a club called Blackheath Rugby Football Club where his friends were playing.
"My first touch of a rugby ball was when I was about that age but it wasn't very serious. It was just socializing with the guys. It wasn't until I was a little bit older that I actually played a bit with the Blackheath third seed, a very low level," said Robinson.
In the beginning, Robinson found himself socializing with the football club more than anything. Surprisingly, his main interest was in rowing in which he obtained junior and senior status.
"Rowing was my first love. Rugby was a past time, along with such things as soccer, tug-of-war, which I did semi-professional. Table tennis and snooker were also other big passions I had as a kid. And a lot of outdoor activities, like I was a boy scout, sea cadet, army cadet, those types of things," said Robinson.
At the age of 26, Robinson, the sporty and outdoorsy Brit, came to Canada. It was here in Ottawa that a friend of Robinson's asked him to come out and join the Ottawa Irish Rugby Football Club.
"I started to play, but I was just a third division player and socialized more than anything. And then I got really into it. That's what happens. You get the bug," said Robinson. "You make new friends in a new country. Lots of Irish guys, English guys, Welsh and Canadians. And rugby was in its infancy here in Canada. There were a lot of expatriates. So I got more involved and became third team captain."
In the early 1980s, Robinson went on to reign as president of the Ottawa Irish Club. While there was a strong calling and need for high school rugby coaches, Robinson began to contemplate a coaching career of his own. But before pursuing one, Robinson helped coach the Quebec under-19 boy's provincial team in Ottawa at their training camps in Quebec, Montreal and Ottawa. In 1975, Robinson took the boys to the Canada Rugby Cup in Regina and this is how Robinson developed a keen interest for the coaching side of the sport. Up until 1982, Robinson found himself guest coaching here and there and then went on to serve at Hillcrest High School. At this point in his career, Robinson had completed his National Coaching Certification Program Level I and therefore introduced to the safety and technical factors of coaching. Since then, Robinson has gone on to receive his third level of coaching.
"I'm inclined to go to for level four or five, but I also have to consider that I'm 60 years old. Are there any benefits of doing that? What would I get out of it? But it's the interest, right. Obtaining more knowledge to pass onto your team," said Robinson.
For Robinson, it's not the glory or the travel for which he has reaped the most rewards. It's the players who have highlighted his long and illustrious rugby-coaching career.
"Definitely the most rewarding is to see the players grow and excel in their sport, become better, to become more elite at their sport and to move on and play at a higher level. That's what it's all about," said Robinson. "They are the most important. To me progress is your product. And the product is the player. If I can move them on to play at a higher level or wherever they want to play and have fun and enjoy it and get the rewards out of that. Better the sport; better the sport for Canada. Then I feel I've done a good job."
Apart from playing, Robinson encourages his Gee-Gees to attack the sport from all sides through coaching and referring.
Away from the field, Robinson, a Director of Sales for Wilcom Systems Ltd., an information technology/information management, professional services company, admits he's a homebody who enjoys watching TV and movies and walking his dogs Winston and Churchy. In the wintertime, he is a downhill-ski instructor at nearby Camp Fortune and throughout the summer months he loves to play golf.
"Really, my life is my little family, my wife and two daughters. I think it's fun to relax a little and do a number of things, but do them equally," he said.
Congratulations to Robinson for having such a beneficial impact on the development of rugby and the sport's future stars in our nation's capital.
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