Versatile sportsman who excelled in wrestling, judo and Highland Games

Born: October 28, 1947;

Died: June 14, 2019

WILLIE Robertson, who has died aged 71, was a versatile and highly successful Scottish sportsman who won national honours in several sports and twice represented his country at wrestling in Commonwealth Games.

He also gained a Scottish international vest in athletics, was a triple British heavyweight wrestling champion as well as multiple Scottish champion, won a Scottish judo title, was a top Highland Games heavyweight athlete over several years and a noted prop forward for Corstorphine and Highland rugby clubs. He won a silver and two bronze medals in the hammer throw at the Scottish championships and figured in the annual ranking lists for that event between 1969 and 2008, his final appearance coming at the age of 61.

Once retired from competitive athletics he wanted to put something back into the sport and became an accomplished throws coach with Falkirk Victoria Harriers where he encouraged and developed a number of young throwers. Several of his hammer protégés in particular went on to enjoy considerable success, Kyle Randalls, Myra Perkins and Ciaran Wright among others. He also regularly officiated at competitions and was a well-known figure at Highland Games all over the country.

His initial interest as a member of Edinburgh Athletic Club was as an aspiring sprinter but, although decent at club level, it was apparent he would not progress further. With his powerful physique it was inevitable he would gravitate to strength based events and he began hammer throwing with the Field Events Club at Edinburgh University sports ground at Craiglockhart under the eagle eye of well-known coach Bob Watson, the former groundsman there.

He supplemented this with weight training at the city’s Dunedin Weightlifting Club in a former wartime decontamination building in the Meadows. Soon he became a formidable exponent of the event representing Edinburgh A.C. in Scottish and British Leagues while claiming bronze medals in 1971 and ’73 and silver in ’74 at the Scottish championships, when he also represented Scotland in an international in Oslo against Norway and Bulgaria.

By then he had been competing regularly at ‘heavy’ events at amateur Highland Games and while at Strathallan Games decided to enter the Scottish Cumberland style wrestling championship despite never having previously wrestled. Six bouts later he was champion much to everyone’s surprise and a wrestling career was launched.

Having been recommended by officials to join Edinburgh’s Milton Wrestling Club he did so at the club’s premises in Abbeyhill where he began to be coached in free style wrestling by George Farquhar, a former Olympic competitor and a Commonwealth Games silver medallist.

Over the next few years he won three British heavyweight titles as well as a Scottish judo title and was selected for the 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch, New Zealand, a tremendous experience.

One of his opponents was All Blacks’ prop forward Gary Knight, with whom Willie had a good rapport and when several years later Knight played in Edinburgh for the All Blacks, they enjoyed a reunion.

In 1985 after an absence from the sport, he won the Scottish title aged 38 and was selected for the Edinburgh Commonwealth Games of 1986, a fitting end to his wrestling career. Throughout much of his time wrestling he combined it with rugby as a noted prop forward for Corstorphine for many seasons and one with Highland.

In 1975 he turned professional to concentrate on Highland Games, the two codes then being divided, and in 1976 placed third in the Scottish Heavyweight Championship at Crieff. Over six years he competed successfully throughout Scotland, before reinstatement as an amateur in 1980.

William Robertson was born in Sanquhar to William and Elizabeth, fifth of six children, Elizabeth, Robert, James, Margaret and Ina the others. The family lived in various places before moving in about 1956 to Humbie Farm, Kirkliston. Educated at Kirkliston and Winchburgh schools, Willie then attended the Edinburgh School of Building where he won a medal before completing a stonemasonry apprenticeship.

He later joined Historic Scotland working at Linlithgow Palace and Fort George among other places after which he moved into building control, becoming a building inspector with Edinburgh Council. After several years in that field he became a lecturer in building at Telford College, having attended teacher training college.

A highly thought of craftsman, he designed and supervised the building of the stonework for The Briggers memorial at South Queensferry, commemorating those who died in the construction of the Forth Bridge, unveiled by the then First Minister Alex Salmond. He also designed and collaborated in the building of the Millenial Cairn in Torphichen.

In May 1982 in Edinburgh he married Angela Reid, a nurse originally from Auchterarder, with the couple enjoying 37 happy years together living in Torphichen in a house mostly built by Willie and had two children, Alan and Hazel. They met in Lorient, Brittany, in 1980 where he was competing in the Inter Celtic Festival Games while she was there for the music festival.

Willie was a standout character, a gentle giant with a great sense of fun and mischief who was held in huge affection by all who knew him, as was evident at the large turnout and warmth of feeling for him at his funeral.

He is survived by his wife, children, brothers and sisters.

JACK DAVIDSON