Matti Ensio Nykänen (born 17 July 1963; Jyväskylä, Finland) is a Finnish former ski jumper who won five Olympic medals (four gold), nine World Championships medals (five gold) and 22 Finnish Championships medals (13 gold). Most notably, Nykanen won three gold medals at the 1988 Winter Olympics, becoming, along with Yvonne van Gennip of the Netherlands, the most successful athlete there. Nykänen is the only ski jumper in history to have won all five of the sport's major competitions; gold medal in the Olympic Games (three times), World Championships (once) and Ski flying World Championships (once), and finished first in the overall World Cup (four times) and Four Hills Tournament (twice).
Since the 1990s, his status as a celebrity has mainly been fueled, not by his sporting achievements, but instead by his colourful personal relationships, his career as a singer, and various incidents often related to heavy use of alcohol and violent behaviour. He was sentenced to jail for 26 months following a stabbing incident in 2004, and again for 16 months after aggravated assault on his wife in 2009
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 at the time.He was also the first ever to win gold medals on both hills at the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary. In 1986 he flew 191 metres in Planica, a world record that stood briefly until Piotr Fijas (Poland) flew 194 metres, again in Planica, in 1987.His other achievements include a total of nine medals (five golds) at the World Championship level.He also won a total of 46 World Cup competitions (more than any other ski jumper) and won the overall title four times (also a record, currently shared with Adam Małysz POL).He won the prestigious Four Hills Tournament twice.He competed in the FIS Ski Flying World Championships five times and placed in the medals every time. Nykänen also won the ski jumping competition at the Holmenkollen ski festival twice (1982, 1987). In 1987, Nykänen was awarded the Holmenkollen Medal (shared with Hermann Weinbuch).
On 28 February 2008, he won the International Masters Championship, the world title for veterans.
A movie about the life of Matti Nykänen simply called Matti was released in 2006, with Finnish actor Jasper Pääkkönen cast as Nykänen. The movie concentrated on Nykänen's exploits beyond the ski-jumping hills.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matti_Nyk%C3%A4nen