The roots of skiing in Finland can be found in Kuopio and Puijo

  Skiing has centuries old traditions in Finland, and this favorite winter sport of ours dates back to the 19th century. The cross-country skiing event arranged at Puijo in 1887 can be considered the first skiing competition in Finland. In the beginning most skiing competitions were taken to very flat terrain, like on the ice of a lake, but Puijo pioneered by arranging its competitions in forest with hills.  
  The first ski-jumping competition took place in Helsinki in 1886, but only a few weeks later Kuopio held its first ski-jumping event.

The first jumping hill in Puijo built in 1911
 Ski-jumping started in Kuopio in the 1880's when boys jumped in a very small jump landing on flat ground. The development of the sport got started after we had learnt from the Norwegians that landing in a hill was considerably easier. The first real jumping hill was built in Huuhanmäki in 1901, and Yrjö Hyvärinen jumped 13,5 metres in this hill the following year. At the beginning of the 1900's several small jumping hills were built in Kuopio, and Puijo got its jumping hill in 1911. The first competition was held on 19.2.1911, and the winner was Onni Harlin.
  In 1915 the best jumps were over 20 metres, so it was no wonder that people got interested and there were about 800 spectators watching the competition.
  In the 1910's Puijo had already become one of the most important skiing centres in Finland. The first winter games in Puijo were held in 1916, and the Finnish championships followed a year later. Puijo developed as a winter sports centre: a sledge slide was built and the history of Finnish Alpine skiing got started when the first slalom and downhill races were arranged in Puijo in 1934.
 
The jumping hills in Puijo have been built several times
  A new jumping hill was built in 1926, the longest jumps being 29 metres. The hill didn't, however, fulfill the international requirements, and a new hill was built in 1929. In the 1930's the jumps were as long as 45 metres. 
  In the 1940's the sport was dominated by the Pietikäinen brothers from Kuopio. This success started when Lauri Pietikäinen won in the winter games in Puijo in 1941.  Aatto and Matti Pietikäinen were his successors, and finally Matti Pietikäinen won the World Championship in Falun in 1954. 
  Since there had been plenty of successful ski-jumpers in Kuopio, people started to dream of building a really big hill. The dreams came true in 1949. The opening competition was held on 20.3.1949, witnessed by 25 000 people who had been gathered at Puijo. Matti Pietikäinen set the first record: 86 metres. In 1951 Olavi Kuronen jumped over 90 metres, and later also the 100-metre mark was broken. This wooden hill was good enough till 1982 when a normal hill was built for the Junior World Championships in 1983.
  In the 1950's Kuopio and Puijo had a very good reputation as a skiing centre, attracting yearly over 30 000 people to follow the games. The facilities developed gradually. In the mid-70's Puijo got its first plastic covered hill, which made it possible to train in summer as well. The normal hill built in 1983 also got a plastic cover.
 
A chance of World Cup
  The attraction of Puijo winter games had diminished by the 1980's since the World Cup was introduced into the Nordic skiing events as well. In the winter of 1994-95, however, Kuopio got a chance to arrange a World Cup event by accident because in December the weather was too warm in Central Europe to arrange any skiing events. Mika Kojonkoski, the Finnish ski-jumpers' head-coach, had heard that the International Skiing Federation (FIS) was willing to add new events in their schedule, and they gave Kuopio a chance to host a competition on 1.2.1995. The event was a big success, gathering 10 000 spectators. From this on, a World Cup competition has been held in Puijo every winter.
  In year 1999 Puijo had the honor to open the World cup season. The competition was jumped in K120 hill, which is the great pride of Kuopio.  The opening jump of K120 (Today HS 127) hill was in January 1998, performed by Ari-Pekka Nikkola. Nikkola from Puijo, together with Mika Laitinen, Kimmo Savolainen, Janne Väätäinen, Ville Kantee, Matti Hautamäki, Jussi Hautamäki and Janne Happonen has been one of the greatest stars in ski-jumping.