Hello, 

My name is Ari-Heikki Rintaniemi and I live in Espoo Finland. I’ve born in 1984 and I study in the HUT (Helsinki University of Technology). I started fly fishing and fly tying in the age of 11. In the beginning I didn’t have anyone to teach me how to cast or tie flies or how to fish with the fly. I started to read on the subject and tried to learn everything by myself. Step by step I figured out how to tie flies and even learned how to cast properly.  

In 1999 I got interested in fly tying competitions. In that autumn, I participated for the first time in the Finnish fly tying champion competition and I came in second in the youth-category. After that I’ve been in every Finnish championship (except in 2004 when I was in the army) and have had quite good results. I’ve been two times in the second place in the general-category (2001 & 2005) and in 2005 I won the salmon fly-category.  

There are three different categories in the Finnish championships: in the youth and general categories competitors tie mainly trout and salmon flies, but sometimes there are even pike flies, tubeflies and usually a creation task (for example you have to tie a spider using only hook, squirrel dubbing, nylon socking, nylon line, foam and black cock neck!). In the salmon fly category tyers tie only salmon flies (including classics, hairwings, tubes, dry flies etc). The nature of the competition is that the tyers tie ‘against the clock’. There are two separated periods both of which are two hours long.  

Last year, the tasks in the general and youth category (first period) were Yellow Humpy (dry fly), Governor (classic wet fly),  swimming stonefly nymph and (in the second period) Casablanca (streamer) and a creation task (spider). In the first period of the salmon fly category, the tasks were Teno 2 (old Finnish salmon fly), Ackroyd (dee fly) and Red and Yellow Bucktail (hair wing salmon fly). In the second period the tasks were Popham (classic salmon fly ) and Veikko Heiskanen 2 (old Finnish salmon fly). Four judges evaluate the flies and the winner is the one who gets the highest total points. The competition is very prestigious here in Finland and the quality of the flies is excellent every year. 

I’ve also had some good results in different  international fly tying competitions during the last three years. Here are some examples: 

2004:-FQSA multi-composite 4^th.(Twinkle Sky).

2005:-FQSA hair wing creation category 5^th. (Pink Poem)

-FAOL Free style- category 1^st. (The Attitude)

-Irish Open dry fly category 1^st (Dark Fitzgerald) and creation shrimp fly   category 3^rd (A-H’s Orange Shrimp)

-Mustad classic salmon fly category  2^nd (Thunder & Lightning).

2006:-FQSA compulsory feather wing salmon fly 1^st (Parson) and feather wing creation category 3^rd (theme turbulence, fly Disturbed Flow).

 -Irish Open second in the overall competition.  1^st in the creation salmon fly (Ancient Spirit of Mourne), 1^st in the wet fly category (Blue & Mixed), 3^rd in the creation streamer fly category (Jock Scott –streamer)

-in the FFF’s competition I took medal in nine category out of eleven. I won the spey/dee fly category (Lady Caroline), steelhead west coast streamer (Orange Heron), steelhead west coast surface (Green Butt Bomber) and trout soft hackle (PT Brassie).

-in the Fly Tyer of the Year (arranged by flytyingforum.com, generously sponsored by FeathersMc.com) competition I won spey/dee category (Release ‘em)

Nowadays I like to tie mostly classic salmon flies and fishing flies for trout, grayling and salmon. I don’t consider myself as an artistic oriented tyer but as quite a traditional tier who likes to tie those lovely old patterns. My goal is to learn to tie every fly equally well, including classic feather-wings, hair wings, speys/dees, grubs/shrimps etc. 

Tight lines! 

Ari-Heikki Rintaniemi

Here are some of Ari's flies below.  Click on each picture to make it larger.