Photo: Argentinian F4
The inaugural Argentinian Formula 4 champion Federico Hermida will stay in the category this year as he will race in the YACademy Winter Series.
Based on the United States’ eastern coast, YACademy is the official winter series of new Road to Indy rung USF Juniors which is using first-generation F4 cars for its 2022 season.
Hermida will race for International Motorsport, a top karting team at the national level in the USA that is expanding into single-seater racing this year via USF Juniors after 20 years in karts.
“I am very happy for this opportunity to compete in YACademy Winter Series,” said Hermida. “It will be a new experience for me and I will take it from lowest to highest, the mentality is set on great teamwork and circuits knowledge.”
His team-mates over the two-round series, which takes place at Sebring (February 9/10) and Homestead-Miami Speedway (February 15/16), will be Justin Garat and Alan Isambard and both are already signed to race in USF Juniors too.
American driver Garat has been doing F4 testing since last October, while Isambard came third in the USA winter series for shifter karts last year and 19th in the SuperNationals tournament and Homestead-Miami kart championship.
In the equivalent X30 Senior series at Homestead, Isambard won the title and Garat was 22nd after doing two rounds. Garat also came 24th in the KA100 Senior series with a one-round cameo.
This year Isambard is doing the winter series again in the Pro Shifter and X30 Senior classes and fighting at the front.
Velocity Racing Development already has three drivers signed for USF Juniors, with the previously announced Nikita Johnson, the reigning YACademy champion, being joined by Noah Ping and Sam Corry.
Ping has raced in Radical Cup North America for the past two years. He came fifth in the Pro 1500 class last year in a part-time campaign, and 20th in his rookie season in 2020 when he only did two rounds.
Corry is a member of the VRD Academy and has been testing in its F4 cars since last summer. His previous motorsport experience includes sprint car racing on dirt as well as karts. He was 23rd in the US Pro Kart Series’ KA100 Junior class in 2020, and 46th in X30 Junior in 2021.
Also committing to the series is US F4 team Alliance Racing and the combination of DC Autosport with Cape Motorsports. In 2018 and ’19 they collaborated on an US F4 programme, with Cape already a successful USF2000 team, and now they are reuniting again after two years apart. They plan to field three cars in USF Juniors.
The AMR IndyCar Safety Team, which is the on-site response team for all Road to Indy races, has agreed it will attend all USF Juniors events and tests with a multi-person team.