Olil Amble was born in Oslo, Norway in 1963, she is the youngest of 5 siblings and has had an endless interest in horses. It wasn’t easy for her to get in contact with horses since there was no one in her family that kept horses and not many horses around her neighborhood. Slowly she was able to get in contact with horse owners and was able to help out mucking, grooming and get to ride.

Things started to look up when her neighbor brought home a three year old Icelandic horse as a riding horse for her children. The Children were not able to manage the horse and lost interest quickly. Olil was also not able to manage the horse and he threw her off over and over. The interest in horses overtook the fear and she got on the horse again. With time she was able to start to ride the horse and learned that the Icelandic horse had more gaits than a regular horses. The Tölt was something Olil wondered a lot about, she got on a natural tölter and rode him on pavement and listened to the beat to learn.

She then went and took courses with riding instructors on Icelandic horses and started competing. “When I look back I remember this time as very fun and I wouldn’t want to have skipped it. Then I started hearing stories of Iceland, the island where the count of humans and horses was the same which sounded undeniably good.” Olil soon got a job offer from Iceland and she was quick to make the decision and at seventeen years old she went to Iceland and was going to stay one year. In retrospect Olil thinks she was too young to go to Iceland but there was no equine education offered in Norway and therefore not much interest for her to stay in school in her home country.

Olil started to work with horses in Iceland, first at Stóra-Hof and later at Ey in Landeyjar. Olil says it was a very fun time and before she knew it the year was over and she went back to Norway to go to school. Now that she had experienced the life in Iceland she couldn’t wait to return and after less than half a year in Norway she returned to Iceland to work with horses at Ey in Landeyjar and then at Skarð in Landssveit. In 1986 she moved to Stangarholt in Mýrar and lived there for 10 years. Her oldest daughter Freyja was then a newborn and she then had Steinar in 1991 and Brynja in 1993.

Olil has always been interested in breeding and when she lived in the west of Iceland she got the mares that she has since been breding from. Olil got to know Jóhannes Stefánsson from Kleifar and acquired Mugga frá Kleifum daughter of Hnokki frá Steðja and the first prize mare Lygna frá Kleifum.

Mugga is now 26 years old and is still having foals. Olil owns from her three grey mares that she uses in her breeding, Muska, daughter of Frami frá Bakka and Lygnu frá Kleifum and her daugthers, first prize Mylla a Kolfunnur frá Kjarnholtum daughter and Gráhildur daughter of Randver frá Nýjabæ.

“Jóhannes gave us an old broodmare that was one of his favorite mares named Spurning frá Kleifum. From her we got one horse and one mare, Grýla frá Stangarholti daughter of Kolfinnur frá Kjarnholtum and she is the mother of Álfadís frá Selfossi.” Spurning and Mugga are closely related, both are granddaughters of Logi frá Kletti. It was never a plan to breed horses from Jóhannes from Kleifar but she tried to be open minded and breed from many different mares.

When Olil had finally selected the mares that she wanted to breed out of this was the result. “My breeding goal has always to breed horses that are suitable in competition and preferably with talents that are extraordinary.” You can say that this goal has been met for example Gormur son of Muska and Sveinn-Hervar frá Þúfu was in B-Finals in B-Class at Landsmót 2008 in his first year of competing. Olil started to compete in Norway; she participated in many disciplines such as dressage, countryside racing, jumping and trail classes. Later she started participating in all disciplines for Icelandic Horses. The last competition she participated in before she left for Iceland was the Nordic Championships in Sweden in 1980 and there she became a Nordic champion in combination. Olil has won many titles on Icelandic Horses like Tölt competitions, A and B Classes at Fjórðungsmóts and other large competitions. She has been in finals in Tölt competitions and A and B Classes at Landsmóts. Olil has won Tölt at Lansmót and is a many times Icelandic Champion, Nordic Champion and a World Champion.

• Next