Anssi Kankkonen

Anssi Kankkonen (born 11 October 1968) is a Finnish professional golfer who played on the European Tour.

Anssi Kankkonen
Personal information
Born	(1968-10-11) 11 October 1968 (age 56) Lahti, Finland
Height	1.81 m (5 ft 11 in)
Sporting nationality	Finland
Career
Turned professional	1990
Former tour(s)	European Tour Challenge Tour
Professional wins	4
Number of wins by tour
Challenge Tour	3
Other	1

Kankkonen was born in Lahti, the son of former Olympic ski jumping champion Veikko Kankkonen, and followed in his father's footsteps winning a team competition in the Finnish Championships with the Lahti Ski Club team in 1985,^[1] before turning to golf. As an amateur, he represented Finland at the 1990 Eisenhower Trophy.^[2] He turned professional in 1990 and played on the Swedish Golf Tour before joining the Challenge Tour.

Kankkonen recorded his first Challenge Tour win at the 1995 SIAB Open, and almost won another tournament back-to-back, losing a playoff to Thomas Bjørn at the Himmerland Open. He played on the 1996 European Tour but recorded only one top-10, at the English Open, and returned to the Challenge Tour in 1997 where he won two tournaments, the Alianca UAP Challenge in Portugal after triumphing in a three-way playoff, and the Rolex Trophy Pro-Am in Switzerland. He would have made it three but lost a playoff with Knud Storgaard in the season opener, the Ivory Coast Open. He finished fifth on the Challenge Tour ranking to re-join the European Tour in 1998.^[3]

Kankkonen represented Finland at five World Cups (1991, 1992, 1994, 1995, 1997) with a best finish of 19th together with Kalle Väinölä in 1995.^[4][5]

Professional wins (4)

Challenge Tour wins (3)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	Margin of victory	Runner(s)-up
1	4 Jun 1995	SIAB Open	−1 (74-69-68-72=283)	2 strokes	Kalle Väinölä
2	27 Apr 1997	Alianca UAP Challenger	−20 (64-63-70-71=268)	Playoff	Fredrik Lindgren, Nicolas Vanhootegem
3	20 Jul 1997	Rolex Trophy Pro-Am	−12 (66-67-72-71=276)	1 stroke	Thomas Nielsen

Challenge Tour playoff record (1–2)

No.	Year	Tournament	Opponent(s)	Result
1	1995	Himmerland Open	Thomas Bjørn, Nicolas Vanhootegem	Bjørn won with birdie on first extra hole
2	1997	Open de Côte d'Ivoire	Knud Storgaard
3	1997	Alianca UAP Challenger	Fredrik Lindgren, Nicolas Vanhootegem

Nordic Golf League wins (1)

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	7 Sep 2001	PGA Finnish Championship	−8 (71-69-68=208)	1 stroke	Kalle Aitala

Source:^[6]

Team appearances

Amateur

• Eisenhower Trophy (representing Finland): 1990

Professional

• World Cup (representing Finland): 1991, 1992, 1994, 1995, 1997

See also

• 1995 Challenge Tour graduates

References

1. Jussila, Pentti (1998). Suomen hiihto (in Finnish). Helsinki. p. 212. ISBN 951-1-15482-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
2. "1990 World Amateur Team Golf Championship" (PDF). IGF. Retrieved 19 May 2020.
3. "Anssi Kankkonen Bio". European Tour. Retrieved 19 May 2020.
4. "World Cup of Golf". Sentinel. Santa Cruz, California. 13 November 1995. p. B4.
5. "World Cup of Golf". The Monitor. McAllen, Texas. 13 November 1995. p. 3B – via newspapers.com.
6. "Results 2001 PGA Finnish Championship". Golfdata. Retrieved 19 May 2020.

External links

• Anssi Kankkonen at the European Tour official site
• Anssi Kankkonen at the Official World Golf Ranking official site
• Anssi Kankkonen at the Golfdata official site (in Swedish)