Guðmundur Kristinn Guðmundsson

Guðmundur Kristinn Guðmundsson was one of the Icelandic glíma wrestlers competing in the exhibition event of this sport at the 1912 Olympic Games. In 1921, he won the King’s Cup for the best wrestler at the Royal Wrestling Championship at Þingvellir. Guðmundsson contributed to a definitive book about glíma wrestling published in 1916. Guðmundur also took part in the first Icelandic swimming championship in 1910 and won the 1914 All-Icelandic Games (Allsherjarmótið) and was then considered the most versatile athlete in the country. In 1920, he won the Icelandic pentathlon, which included glíma. In this event, he twice defeated Tryggvi Gunnarsson, Iceland’s best wrestler of the time.

In addition to actively competing, Guðmundsson was chairman of the Glimufélagið Armanni (Armanni Wrestling Association) and for many years a member of the board of the Icelandic Sports Association, a member of the Interparliamentary Committee on Sports (1938-39) and chairman of the National Sports Committee (1940-46, 1950-53).

Guðmundsson was born as the son of a farmer. In 1901, the family moved to Reykjavík, where his father owned a restaurant. He later married Ragnhildur Jónsdóttir. Guðmundsson worked as a clerk for Landsverslun Islands, a state owned trading company, from 1917-27. Subsequently, he was one of the founders and until 1949 office manager for Olíuverzlun Íslands hf. (Iceland Oil Ltd.). He also became a shareholder of Olíufélagið h.f. (Oil Company Ltd) and handled the company’s domestic affairs from 1949. The company sold petrol in Iceland under the Esso brand.

Even though he suffered from vision problems in later years, he always continued his sports activities, particularly swimming and gymnastics.