The Australian Women's Register

A schoolteacher from Adelaide, Gillian Rolton was a show and dessage rider from the age of ten until her early twenties. She began Eventing and Showjumping at twenty-one, and competed at an international level from 1984. Rolton was long-listed for the Olympic Games at Los Angeles and Seoul, but missed out on both due to injury (to the horse in the first instance, and to herself in the second). In 1992 she was a late inclusion the Australian equestrian team competing at the Barcelona Olympic Games after she beat all male members of the team in the final selection trial at Savernake, England. Competing alongside Matt Ryan and Andrew Hoy, Rolton rode an excellent round on Peppermint Grove on the final day of competition, and became the first Australian female equestrian to win a gold medal.

Rolton achieved even greater notoriety after the Olympic Games in Atlanta in 1996. Thrown twice from Peppermint Grove in the cross-country section, Rolton remounted and finished the course despite a broken collar-bone and two broken ribs. The Australian team, comprised of Andrew Hoy, Wendy Schaeffer, Phillip Dutton and Rolton, won gold.

From 2003, Rolton coordinated and coaching the EFA National Young Eventing Rider Squad. She was an FEI International Eventing judge and on the Board of Adelaide International Horse Trials.