With Kristoffer Reitan’s victory at the Truist Championship, there are now two players from Norway with PGA Tour wins — and both happen to be members of AmateurGolf.com.

The other, of course, is 2018 U.S. Amateur champion Viktor Hovland.

If you’re an aspiring golfer in Norway, that feels like more than coincidence.

Reitan’s rise to the PGA Tour spotlight has taken a different path than Hovland’s, but longtime followers of AmateurGolf.com may remember seeing his name years ago, long before PGA Tour trophies entered the picture.

As a teenager from Nesøya, Norway, Reitan was already building an impressive international résumé while maintaining a player profile as a lifetime member of AmateurGolf.com.

That early bio now reads like a remarkably accurate scouting report.

“Kristoffer Reitan plays for Oslo Golfklubb. The Norwegian native began playing golf at the age of five. At 14, Reitan is a scratch player with several impressive finishes nationally and internationally.”

Back in 2012, Reitan won the Suzann Junior Challenge — hosted by LPGA star Suzann Pettersen — by a staggering 14-shot margin. He also finished eighth in Norway’s national junior Order of Merit and quickly began producing results internationally.

Among his top finishes that year:

• 3rd — English Boys U14 Championship (Reid Trophy)
• 3rd — Doral Publix Junior Classic (14–15 division)
• 2nd — PARS Florida International Junior

At the time, he was simply viewed as one of Norway’s brightest junior talents.

Now, he’s a PGA Tour winner.

Different Path Than Viktor Hovland

While Hovland’s rise followed a more traditional elite-amateur route — NCAA champion at Oklahoma State, U.S. Amateur champion, and rapid PGA Tour ascension — Reitan’s climb was less linear.

He spent one season at the University of Texas before turning professional in 2018, but not before assembling one of the strongest amateur campaigns by a European player that year.

Reitan climbed to No. 47 in the AmateurGolf.com World Rankings in 2018 and produced results across some of the game’s biggest amateur events:

• Round of 16 — U.S. Amateur at Pebble Beach
• T10 — European Amateur Championship
• T10 — Irish Open Amateur
• 4th — French Amateur Stroke Play Championship
• Qualified for the U.S. Open through Final Qualifying

One of the defining moments from that summer came at Pebble Beach during the U.S. Amateur, when Reitan faced fellow Norwegian Viktor Hovland in match play.

In a rare Norway-vs.-Norway showdown, Hovland won 7&6 on his way to claiming the championship. The margin looks lopsided, but context matters: Hovland was playing arguably the best golf of his amateur career and defeated quarterfinal opponent Austin Squires by the same score during that same run.