Olivia Amber
BISHOP, CALIFORNIA
“My mom was a big runner, and every morning when I was growing up she would go for a run. I don’t really remember this clearly, but I guess I was always like, ‘I have to go,’ so she’d let me run with her for a few minutes before saying, ‘Okay, you have to stop, let me go run.’ I was always interested in running around, and I kind of just ran everywhere instead of walking around the yard, to class, basically anywhere.”
Olivia Amber grew up in the northwoods of Wisconsin, watching her mom run before dawn in all kinds of weather. She started racing in both running and skiing, eventually becoming Colby College's first All-American Nordic skier. After graduation, she moved west. Ski tracks turned into singletrack. Weekends became long days in the Marin Headlands, which then became bigger missions in the Sierra, linking climbs, ridgelines, and valleys on foot. Running wasn’t just training anymore. It was how she explored.
“I grew up in Wisconsin, where there are no mountains. My parents were school teachers, so we had the summers to go do things as a family. Every summer, we'd go out to the Beartooths out of Red Lodge, Montana and play in these wild, preserved places.”
These days, Olivia is drawn to big, complex efforts. She’s stood on podiums at races like the Quad Dipsea and Headlands 50K and tested herself on technical courses from Broken Arrow in California to Monte Rosa in Europe and even Ultra-Trail Cape Town in South Africa. Her most intense pursuit (so far) was setting the women’s Fastest Known Time on Norman’s 13, a 100-plus-mile link-up of all thirteen of the California Sierra’s 14,000-foot peaks. Over roughly 89 hours, she climbed more than 40,000 vertical feet, moving through the high Sierra with a clear sense of purpose. Running a bit farther. Staying out a bit longer. Testing the limits of her curiosity.
“I entered the first night by descending off the Palisade ridgeline in ripping winds, stomach revolting, hands numb, surrounded by loose, microwave-sized blocks, and too cold to stop. I still had days of 5th class scrambling, running, and off-trail terrain ahead. It was a reminder that there are different kinds of suffering: The kind that happens, and the kind that’s chosen. Choosing it, even when it broke me down, gave me a deeper sense of freedom and strength.”
Olivia’s mindset has been shaped as much by challenge as by success. In recent years, she has managed serious health issues, including surgery for stage 4 endometriosis, and she’s honest about how that changed her relationship to effort. Choosing to suffer on a long run or big project feels different when you’ve known pain you didn’t choose. Now based in the Eastern Sierra and running for The North Face, she splits her time between training, racing, and supporting other athletes through coaching and mentorship. Olivia isn’t chasing a single defining result. She’s building a body of work that stretches from snow to trail.
Career Highlights
● Fastest Known Time, Female, Supported, Norman’s 13,105 miles 40,000ft, Lone Pine, California (2025)
● 3rd Place, UTMB Monte Rosa 100km, Aosta Valley, Italy (2025)
● Climbed, Lurking Fear, VI C2 5.9, El Capitan, Yosemite (2025)
● 1st Place Overall and Course Record, Ultra Fjord 30km, Puerto Natales, Chile (2023)
● Fastest Known Time, Female, Unsupported, Huemul Circuit, El Chalten, Argentina (2023)
● 1st Place and Course Record, Seven Sisters WMRA World Cup, Donegal, Ireland (2022)
● 3rd Place, USATF 50-Mile Championships, Cool, California (2020)
● 1st Place, Quad Dipsea, Mill Valley, California (2019)
● Former NCAA Division I All-American Cross Country Skier