Driver earns 1st NASCAR Cup Series win with late surge at LVMS — PHOTOS
Nothing was normal about the circumstances surrounding Josh Berry’s first NASCAR Cup Series start at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in 2023.
Berry was thrown into the Hendrick Motorsports No. 9 Chevrolet to substitute for an injured Chase Elliott, who suffered a leg injury in a snowboarding accident earlier in the week.
On the plane ride home after a 29th-place finish, Berry recalled thinking he had blown his opportunity to run in the Cup Series.
The flight home after Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 will be remembered for a much different reason.
Berry passed Daniel Suarez after a late restart and held on to win his first NASCAR Cup Series race, driving the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford around Las Vegas’ 1½-mile oval.
Berry finished 1.358 seconds ahead of Suarez and led 18 total laps. Ryan Preece finished third.
“We fought hard all day,” Berry said. “We had a mistake on pit road, but the guys were able to rebound. We were able to get back up front. The strategy went all wild, and we were on the front side of it, was able to get up front, battle Joey (Logano) for a while and hold him off with a win.”
It’s the first win for Berry, 34, in his 53rd Cup Series start. Berry has two Xfinity Series wins at Las Vegas.
For Wood Brothers Racing, it’s the legendary race team’s 101st Cup Series win for the organization that was founded in 1950.
Berry “dominated those last 20 laps,” said Wood Brothers Racing president Jon Wood, who brought his two small dogs into the winner’s post-race press conference and ran the team’s social media accounts as he answered questions.
‘Do amazing things’
Berry’s car was fast this weekend. He qualified seventh and finished eighth in the first two stages. Then after a pit stop on lap 172, Berry had to come back down pit road to tighten a loose wheel.
That forced the hand of crew chief Miles Stanley to set up Berry to pit late in the race and go the final 67 laps on a tank of fuel. Even though there was another caution on lap 244, Stanley said it helped Berry get the track position he needed.
“The best strategy for us at that time was to put ourselves in the best track position that we could, and that was by staying out,” Stanley said. “It all played out where we didn’t have to run it burn it dry or save fuel, but we were getting close there to where we were going to have to start deciding on how we were going to save or how we were going to make it.”
Berry had battled Logano for the lead earlier before the caution and had to get past Logano and Suarez again after the restart with 20 laps to go.
Berry passed Suarez with 16 laps to go and never gave up the lead.
“Our performance to the start of the season has 100 percent exceeded my expectations,” Berry said. “It just goes back to just trusting your instincts as a driver if you’re in a good situation and surrounded by good people, and have fast race cars, then you can do amazing things.”
‘Soak in the moment’
Just like his start in this race two years ago, nothing has been normal about Berry’s journey. The Hendersonville, Tennessee, native said about five years ago, he was content with trying to be one of the greats in the local short track scene.
Berry won the 2020 series title in the NASCAR Advance Auto Parts Weekly Series driving for NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr. That kicked off Berry’s journey to the Cup Series, where he ran in the Xfinity Series for three seasons and got the call to run in the Cup Series full-time for Stewart-Haas Racing in 2024.
His path took another turn when Stewart-Haas Racing announced last May it would be shutting down at the end of 2024. That’s when the Wood Brothers called.
Berry is “who I wanted,” team CEO and co-owner Eddie Wood said.
The win locked Berry into this year’s NASCAR Cup Series playoffs and qualified him for May’s All-Star Race.
Unlike most winners, Berry elected to not do a big burnout on the front stretch, an homage to his days racing on the local short track scene and working on his own cars.
“That’s what I wanted to do. That’s who I am as a person,” Berry said. “I’ve spent my whole life working on my own race cars and building race cars and got my ass chewed a couple of times for doing burnouts when I shouldn’t and tore stuff up. I just wanted to soak in the moment.”
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
