Matti Nykänen

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Lore & Background

For most of the 1980s, Nykänen and Jens Weißflog of East Germany dominated the sport. Nykänen won gold and silver at the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo. His 17.5-point gold medal victory was the largest margin of victory in Olympic ski jumping history at the time. He was also the first ever to win gold medals on both hills at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. He set five world records in total, the most of any ski jumper in history. On 16 March 1984, he set ski jumping world distance records on official training twice at 182 metres, and on the next day at 185 metres, all three in Oberstdorf, West Germany. On 15 March 1985, he set two more world distance records on official training at 187 metres and at 191 metres, both on Velikanka bratov Gorišek in Planica, Yugoslavia.

Reader's Guide

Matti Nykänen's significance lies in his unparalleled competitive achievements and his later life as a controversial public figure. He is one of only two ski jumpers in history – the other being Domen Prevc – to have won all five of the sport's major individual titles: a gold medal at the Winter Olympics (three times), the Ski Jumping World Championships (once), the Ski Flying World Championships (once), four World Cup overall titles, and the Four Hills Tournament (twice). His four World Cup titles is an all-time male record shared with Adam Małysz. Nykänen remains the only male five-time ski flying world record holder in history. After his career, Nykänen became a pop singer, releasing three studio albums, and was involved in multiple well-publicized incidents of violence and alcohol abuse, leading to prison sentences. He died on 4 February 2019 at age 55, suffering from chronic pancreatitis.

Did You Know?

• Nykänen is one of only two ski jumpers in history – the other being Domen Prevc – to have won all five of the sport's major individual titles.
• His four World Cup overall titles is an all-time male record shared with Adam Małysz.
• He remains the only male five-time ski flying world record holder in history.
• He was the first ever to win gold medals on both hills at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary.
• His 17.5-point gold medal victory at the 1984 Winter Olympics was the largest margin of victory in Olympic ski jumping history at the time.

A Decade of Dominance

Throughout the 1980s, Matti Nykänen and East Germany's Jens Weißflog essentially owned ski jumping, and the Finn's medal haul reflects the depth of that supremacy. Competing from 1981 to 1991, he amassed five Winter Olympic medals (four gold), nine World Championship medals (five gold), and 22 Finnish national titles (14 gold). His 1984 Sarajevo gold came with a 17.5-point margin that was the largest in Olympic ski jumping history at the time, and his 1988 Calgary campaign made him the first jumper ever to win gold on both hills in a single Games. That winter, he tied the Netherlands' Yvonne van Gennip as the most decorated athlete of the entire Olympics. His World Cup résumé is equally remarkable: four overall titles—an all-time male record shared with Poland's Adam Małysz—46 individual race victories, and two Four Hills Tournament wins. He also won the Holmenkollen Ski Festival twice (1982, 1985) and shared the Holmenkollen Medal in 1987. By retirement, he stood as one of only two men in history, alongside Slovenia's Domen Prevc, to have captured every major individual title the sport offers.

Five World Records and Historic Flights

Nykänen holds a distinction no other ski jumper has matched: five world distance records, the most in the sport's history. On 16 March 1984, he leapt 182 metres twice during official training at Oberstdorf in West Germany, then pushed the mark to 185 metres the very next day. A year later, on 15 March 1985, he set two more records at the Velikanka bratov Gorišek hill in Planica, Yugoslavia, reaching 187 metres and then 191 metres. That 191-metre flight stood as the world benchmark until Poland's Piotr Fijas extended it to 194 metres, again in Planica, in 1987. Nykänen remains the only male jumper in history to have set the ski flying world record five times. Beyond raw distance, his 1988 Calgary performance—winning gold on both the normal and large hills—was a first in Olympic history, and his 17.5-point margin in Sarajevo in 1984 was the widest Olympic ski jumping victory recorded up to that point. These records cemented his nickname, 'The Flying Finn,' and established a standard his contemporaries could not touch.

Singer, Stripper, and Celebrity

Once his competitive career wound down, Nykänen reinvented himself in the entertainment world. A group of businessmen pitched him as a pop singer, and his 1992 debut album Yllätysten yö sold more than 25,000 copies, making him the second Olympic gold medalist after Tapio Rautavaara to earn a golden record in Finland. His follow-up, Samurai (1993), failed to replicate that success. By the late 1990s, serious financial difficulties led him to an unlikely gig as a stripper at a restaurant in Järvenpää—a role that drew public criticism of the venue for exploiting his fame. He returned to music in 2002 with the single 'Ehkä otin, ehkä en' ('Maybe I took it, maybe I didn't'), which also became the slogan for a cider brand bearing his name. His third album, Ehkä otin, ehkä en, arrived in 2006. Throughout this period, his celebrity was sustained less by athletic achievement than by his turbulent relationships, his musical experiments, and a string of well-publicised incidents involving heavy drinking and violent outbursts.

Violence, Imprisonment, and a Tragic End

Nykänen's later years were defined by a pattern of escalating violence and legal consequences. His marriage to Mervi Tapola, a wealthy sausage-industry heiress he met in 1999, became the stage for repeated assaults, restraining orders, and a remarkable fifteen separate divorce petitions. In 2004, after a finger-pulling contest with a family friend in Tottijärvi turned violent, he was convicted of aggravated assault and sentenced to 26 months in prison; he was released in September 2005. Days after his release, he stabbed a man in a pizza restaurant in Korpilahti. On Christmas Day 2009, he allegedly wounded Tapola with a knife and attempted to strangle her with a bathrobe belt; charges of attempted manslaughter were dropped for insufficient evidence, but in August 2010 he was convicted of grievous bodily harm, given 16 months in prison, and ordered to pay €5,000 in compensation to his wife for pain and emotional suffering and €3,000 for legal expenses. He died on 4 February 2019 at age 55, suffering from chronic pancreatitis.