Juho-Matti Manninen will return to competition this season after a three-year sabbatical in a F4 boat that he has designed and built.

The Finnish driver who won back-to-back world championships in UIM F4 in 2016 and 2017 told me today:

I had thought I was finished with racing but building a boat myself has reignited my passion.

The racer who has won a total of 13 international medals continued:

We are currently working on propellers and have some good data on what our race pace should be.

Manninen will be competing in the highly competitive Finnish international F-4 RACEWKND championship series and has his brother Juha-Pekka and father Mauri back on his team.

Will the racer who is known by the nick name ‘Magic’ be able to pull another medal out of the hat on his return to racing this year?