Formula 4 United States, the middle series on the Parella Motorsports Holdings open-wheel ladder, is soon to begin its 11th season of action. Feeder Series gives you the rundown of what you should know about the 2026 F4 US season.
By Owen White
After his dominant drive to the 2025 championship, Cooper Shipman has departed the series, as have the other two primary contenders from last season. Shipman, along with third-placed Kekai Hauanio, will compete in FR Americas in 2026, while Venezuela’s Alex Popow Jr is competing in the NACAM Formula 4 series.
Perhaps the biggest change for the series this off-season has come in the form of the series’ ownership and streaming. In early December, Parella Motorsports Holdings acquired Racing America. The two entities merged as one and rebranded to Racing America, the platform on which races will now be broadcast.
The calendar
Once again, F4 US will support FR Americas at all events, and its 2026 schedule is largely unchanged from 2025’s. It again matches FR Americas with the exception of skipping the round at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Like the series it supports, its first round has moved back from the last weekend of March to the second weekend of April, while the Mid-Ohio round has come forward by one week.
- Round 1: NOLA Motorsports Park (9–12 April)
- Round 2: Road America (14–17 May)
- Round 3: Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course (11–14 June)
- Round 4: New Jersey Motorsports Park (31 July–2 August)
- Round 5: Canadian Tire Motorsports Park (3–6 September)
- Round 6: Virginia International Raceway (17–20 September)
- Round 7: Barber Motorsports Park (16–18 October)
The format
The weekend format remains unchanged from previous years. Though details minorly change depending on the weekend and amount of races, weekends follow the same general format. Race weekends commence on Thursdays with a pair of optional 30-minute test sessions. One or two 25-minute practice sessions are held on Friday, followed by a 25-minute qualifying session held on either Friday or Saturday depending on the race weekend.
The first race of the weekend is always held on Saturday regardless of whether the weekend contains two or three races. The starting positions for the first race are set by the results of qualifying, with the grids for the second and third races set by the fastest laps run by each driver in the previous race.
Races are timed, with the maximum time for each race set at 30 minutes. The points system is the same as what is used in F1. There are no points awarded for pole position or fastest lap.
Where to watch
The PMH ladder, including F4 US, has made the switch from free YouTube livestreams to the Racing America streaming service, which costs $19.99 a month. Races will be streamed there going forward. Races can also be viewed on Racing America’s live channel on Amazon Prime Video. Live timing is available on Race Monitor.
Teams and drivers
LC Racing Academy, which competed in the full 2025 season with Caleb Campbell, have announced no plans to continue in the series. Several teams that competed in select rounds of the previous season are also absent from the opening round – Scuderia Buell, Rase Motorsports and Toney Driver Development.
Kiwi Motorsport
After winning both the teams’ and drivers’ championships in 2025, Kiwi Motorsport return with three cars for the new season. The team, who won nine consecutive races last year with Cooper Shipman, will be aiming for their fifth teams’ championship in a row, including those won as Crosslink Kiwi Motorsport.
Caleb Campbell (#68) will enter his second season in F4 US as the only driver on the grid to have a win in the series, which came at Road America last year. The 17-year-old Canadian began his single-seater career in 2023 in the Skip Barber Formula Race Series before competing in the final round of the 2024 Ligier JS F4 Championship, the predecessor of the Ligier Junior Formula Championship. Campbell scored one win and three total podiums in his rookie F4 US season en route to fifth place in the championship.
Zach Fourie (#15) returns to Kiwi Motorsport for his first full-time season in F4 US. The South African driver debuted in the 2024 Ligier JS F4 championship, running the final round in that year and the first in the rebranded LJFC 2025 for Jensen Global Advisors before moving to Kiwi for three rounds in the latter season. He stepped up to F4 US for the season finale last October at Barber and scored one podium. Seventeen-year-old Fourie also won in all four of his starts in the 2025 Formula Pro USA Western Championship’s FPUSA-4 class at Sonoma Raceway and Laguna Seca.
Ayden Kohut (#18) is the lone American driver on the grid for the opening round. The Texas-based driver made his debut behind the wheel of a Ligier JS F4 car last June at Laguna Seca in the Formula Pro USA Western Championship’s FPUSA-4 class. Kohut finished in the top five in both of his starts.
Crosslink Motorsports
After Hauanio led the team to finish second in the 2025 teams’ championship, Crosslink return to the series with Fernando Rivera to try to reclaim the teams’ championship they last earned in 2024 as the merged Crosslink Kiwi Motorsport entity.
Fernando Rivera (#16) will be making his debut in F4 US in 2026. The Mexican driver will compete in the series alongside a NACAM F4 programme with Ram Racing. Rivera has a best finish of fourth place in that programme so far and a career best of second place in the series.
MLT Motorsports
Georgia-based MLT Motorsports enter their third season in F4 US, having now expanded their operations to all three steps on the PMH ladder. Their first two seasons in the championship yielded six wins and eight further podiums, all courtesy of Popow Jr.
After competing in the opening round of USF Juniors with Exclusive Autosport in February, Cole Medeiros (#77) will contest his rookie season in F4 US. Fifteen-year-old Medeiros made his single-seater debut earlier this year in the Formula FARA winter series, scoring one podium. He also drove for Exclusive in the 2026 YACademy Winter Series, in which he finished ninth. In 2025, the Canadian won the Florida Winter Tour ROK Micro, Rotax Max Challenge Canada Junior Max and ROK Canadian Nationals Junior titles.
Momentum Motorsports
After competing in both FR Americas and LJFC in 2025, Momentum Motorsports are set to return to F4 US for the first time since 2023. The South Carolina–based team secured a best finish of sixth place in that season, doing so on two occasions with American driver Garrett Dettman in the car.
Canadian Luca Day (#54) will step up to F4 US after competing in LJFC in 2025, when he achieved a best finish of fifth and 14th place overall in the championship. Along with participating in the recent series test at NOLA, the 16-year-old has done additional testing with the team during the off-season in preparation for his rookie campaign.
Champagne Racing
Champagne Racing, the defending winners of both the teams’ and drivers’ championships in LJFC, are set to graduate to F4 US with their title-winning driver, Gastón Irazú. Though the team are competing in the series for the first time since the introduction of the second-generation car, they won six races between 2021 and 2023 as Gonella Racing with drivers Mac Clark and Carl Bennett. Although they will only field one car, the team will be one to watch from day one given their success in LJFC.
Gaston Irazú (#27) steps up to F4 US after a dominant title-winning campaign in LJFC in 2025. With five wins and 10 total podiums in 15 races, Irazú won the title by 33 points and secured his chance to move up on the PMH ladder through use of the scholarship he earned worth nearly $200,000. The 19-year-old Uruguayan will be among the biggest stories entering the season as he attempts to be the first driver to take home the LJFC and F4 US crowns in consecutive seasons.
Velox USA
The team owned by Marco Ambiado, father of 2025 FR Americas runner-up Nicolás Ambiado, return to the PMH ladder for the first time since 2024, when they won one race and scored podiums in five more with Ambiado on the top step of the PMH ladder. They will enter a single car for the season for another Chilean driver.
The highest-finishing returning driver from 2025, Clemente Huerta (#17) moves from Kiwi Motorsport to Velox USA for the new season. The 17-year-old Chilean driver, who made his debut in single-seaters last year, scored six podiums en route to fourth place in the championship. In the off-season, Huerta competed in the final round of the Hoosier Formula Cup at Circuit Paul Ricard, scoring a best finish of sixth.
VMax Motorsport
VMax Motorsport is brand new not just to the series but to racing entirely. The Canadian-led team have already purchased two chassis, with plans to enter one car for their debut season in F4 US.
After spending the last two years entering selected rounds of the Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America series, Robert Soroka (#93) makes the move to F4 US to debut for the team he founded. The Canadian, born in 2002, has tested at several venues throughout the off-season in preparation for the opening round, in which he will be the only owner-driver in the series. Soroka last competed in F4 US in 2019, making nine starts with Jay Howard Driver Development and achieving a best finish of 10th.
The grid at a glance
| Team | # | Driver |
| Kiwi Motorsport | 15 | Zach Fourie |
| 18 | Ayden Kohut | |
| 68 | Caleb Campbell | |
| Crosslink Motorsports | 16 | Fernando Rivera |
| Velox USA | 17 | Clemente Huerta |
| Champagne Racing | 27 | Gastón Irazú |
| Momentum Motorsports | 54 | Luca Day |
| MLT Motorsports | 77 | Cole Medeiros |
| VMax Motorsport | 93 | Robert Soroka |
Header photo credit: Gavin Baker
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