Sitting eighth in the Formula 4 CEZ standings in his rookie campaign, 15-year-old Javier Herrera made a one-off appearance in the Italian F4 Championship at Monza last month, finishing 10th in race three and barely missing out on a rookie podium. Feeder Series caught up with the Jenzer Motorsport driver to learn about his first year in single-seater competition.

By Marco Albertini

In the third race of the third round of the 2025 Italian F4 season at Monza, Zhenrui Chi took a surprise maiden F4 win ahead of Luka Sammalisto and Bart Harrison. But there was an arguably bigger surprise a bit further behind, at the tail end of the points.

Tenth overall and fourth among the rookies was series debutant and Jenzer Motorsport driver Javier Herrera, who mainly races in F4 CEZ for the same team. Much like eventual F4 CEZ champion Oscar Wurz last year, Mexico’s Herrera capitalised on a nearly two-month gap between rounds in his main campaign to make his debut in Italian F4.

Herrera started 25th of 40 cars in his debut race and ran as high as 21st before picking up front wing damage on the final safety car restart and falling to 29th. Starting 27th for race two, Herrera rose to 19th by the end of lap two as he avoided a multi-car collision. He fell to 27th following the restart but took advantage of a crash between Emanuele Olivieri and Artem Severiukhin with two laps left to cross the line in 21st, which became 19th after post-race penalties were applied.

Herrera started the third and final race 23rd and charged to 17th ahead of the final restart in a safety car–filled contest. With only one lap remaining, Herrera seemed to have almost no chance of scoring points, but he gained two places in the first half of the lap before passing Jenzer Motorsport teammate Bader Al Sulaiti at the final corner to cross the line 14th. 

It wasn’t worth much at the time, but that pass on the Qatari soon proved pivotal. Post-race penalties for Kirill Kutskov, Alex Powell, Salim Hanna and Sebastian Wheldon lifted the Monterrey native to 10th in the final results.

“The races were really chaotic, [with] a lot of crashes and gravel on the track,” Herrera told Feeder Series. “I was a bit cautious especially in the first two races because I just wanted to finish them, and I think I could’ve done a better job.

“I was less cautious in race three and managed to get a good result, just picked up the pieces. But with a lot of safety cars, it was hard to make up places especially since I was starting at the back.

“I was lacking pace in general, had a problem with the engine and had to change it, but in the end, we managed to salvage a P14. This is my first Italian F4 race. This level is completely different from CEZ, but it was a very good experience.”

Herrera was one of several drivers in the field with experience in F4 CEZ but one of only two running a full campaign this year. Fellow Jenzer Motorsport drivers Bart Harrison and Teo Schropp had competed in the season-opening round at Red Bull Ring back in April, with Harrison dominating and Schropp finishing fourth in race two. Italian F4 regular Luca Viisoreanu of Real Racing won race three on his only F4 CEZ appearance this year.

Harrison, Schropp and Viisoreanu have all taken in Italian F4 points on multiple occasions, but Herrera’s 10th place at Monza meant he  jumped ahead of Maffi Racing’s David Walther, third in F4 CEZ with a win and three podiums but 31st in Italian F4 with a best finish of 13th. F4 CEZ’s 2024 runner-up Kirill Kutskov has scored points twice this year in Italian F4, while 2023 runner-up Reno Francot stood on the podium twice in his first outings in the series this year.

“I don’t think the level of CEZ is bad,” Herrera said. “It’s good, but in the Italian championship you compete against the big boys, the best in the world. You really feel that you’re on another level. The drivers are kind of robotic, especially at the front. It’s always super competitive and you have to be much more careful than in CEZ.”

Herrera currently sits eighth in the F4 CEZ points with a best result of fourth last time out at the Salzburgring, and he came close to a podium on three other occasions. He came fifth in the third race of the season, missing out on a podium by just 0.043 seconds in a four-way fight for third at the line. Then at Salzburg, three weeks before his Italian F4 debut, Herrera held third place for much of race two before contact with Simon Schranz at Turn 2 spun him out of the points. He ran as high as second in race three but retired in the pits three laps from the end.

Three rounds into his rookie campaign in the series, Herrera said he had room to improve in his performances.

“To be honest, I expected a little bit better from this first part of the season,” Herrera said. “But I think I have improved myself as a driver, especially with the rounds in FWS and Italian F4.

“In the racing aspect I also improved a lot. It’s completely different from karts. [I’m] not quite happy with the progress and I think we can do a much better job, but I’m quite happy with what I’ve learned, and I need to keep working harder to catch up to the fast guys.”

Herrera spent most of his karting career in his native Mexico and United States, but Europe is familiar to him already. He got his first taste of European karting in 2022, finishing 28th of 36 X30 Junior competitors in the final of the IAME Euro Series’ Genk round.

Still, he never featured at the front in 2023 in the OK-Junior class of the FIA Karting European Championship and the Champions of the Future Euro Series, and for 2024 he went back to North America to race in the United States Pro Kart Series, stepping up from junior to senior karting mid-year.

When he graduated to cars at the Formula Winter Series’ final round in March at Catalunya, Herrera took a best result of 19th in his second ever single-seater race. Now, he’s become a consistent points scorer with Jenzer as he lives out his childhood dreams of racing in Europe, half a world away from his homeland.

“Every aspect of life is different, especially living here in Europe is completely different. It was a bit difficult to adapt, but I guess I do it to do what is my favorite thing, which is racing,” Herrera said.

“To race here is a sacrifice for me, and I’m happy because racing in these championships with formula cars is a dream for me. It’s a big opportunity my dad gave me, and I just need to keep working harder and improve the results.”

Header photo credit: Marco Albertini