“He’s got a future in the Cup Series,” NASCAR legend backs sub-driver Josh Berry after Richmond P2

Jeff Gordon has admitted that Josh Berry has the potential to have a good career at the NASCAR Cup Series level.

“He’s got a future in the Cup Series,” NASCAR legend backs sub-driver Josh Berry after Richmond P2

Josh Berry

Jeff Gordon, the Vice Chairman of Hendricks motorsports, has applauded his team’s substitute driver, Josh Berry, for doing a brilliant job in the absence of Chase Elliott. Moreover, Gordon has been massively impressed with Berry’s outstanding P2 finish at the Richmond Raceway in the NASCAR Cup Series race.

Jeff Gordon, after closely monitoring the progress of Josh Berry at Hendricks Motorsports, has even gone on to say that he has got a future at the Cup Series level. While talking about his exploits at the Richmon Raceway, he said, “I feel like he has done a great job every time he has been in the car,” said Gordon. “You start to see a bit of a trend with him. Of course, we didn’t do him any favors by him starting 30th today. We made one early adjustment that didn’t seem to go the right direction. They got him further behind. So to see them climb up through there and the car come to life, and staying out there paid off and caught the caution.”

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“But Josh, when you look at his lap times, he is a guy that he gets in there, he feels the car out, he doesn’t take too many risks or chances until he knows what he has. Then you just start to see the lap times come and build, and the run starts to come together. And every time I scanned, I kept hearing by the end of the run, Hey, those lap times are really good. Hey, those lap times are similar to the leader,” Gordon added.

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Moreover, Gordon has even admitted that Josh Berry has got everything in him to have a future at the Cup Series level, while shedding light on the same, he added, “Certainly everybody has known his talent watching him in other forms of racing, late models, and the Xfinity Series. You have to put him in other cars with other teams and other people to really see how far he could take it. I think he’s got a future in the Cup Series.”

Jeff Gordon has not shied away from praising the brilliant job that Josh Berry has done for his team since coming on board. Gordon, ardently believes, that Berry has an adept understanding of the Cup Series cars and is very good at managing the tires during challenging situations. He has also talked about his impressive decision-making skills of Berry while going wheel-to-wheel with the other NASCAR Cup Series drivers. Though the shift from Xfinity to Cup car in a short span of time was hard for the JRM driver, he has used the opportunity to the fullest.

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Josh Berry’s take on his Richmond Raceway exploits

Josh Berry
Josh Berry

The NASCAR Cup Series race at the Richmond Raceway did not get underway in an advantageous position for Josh Berry as he was running in the midfield then. Moreover, during the second stage, he even went for a spin courtesy of Ryan Blaney. But as the race continued, the Hendricks Motorsports team’s interim crew chief made a gusty call and decided to keep Berry out on longer runs.

The gamble eventually paid off as a late caution was thrown, and that helped Josh Berry find himself in P2 alongside Kyle Larson on the restart. While he could not pose a serious challenge to Larson, he did manage to shatter his previous best record in the NASCAR Cup Series by finishing second. While talking about his race, after the event, he added, “Man, this is really cool.”

“I have to give all the credit to this NAPA team. Tom (Grey, interim crew chief), Alan (Gustafson, full-time crew chief) remotely, of course, and everybody at Hendrick Motorsports. They made some great calls. When we got some clean track, we weren’t running bad lap times. I’m so glad they tried something different at the end to get us up front. I felt like we were decent the whole time. Just getting in cleaner air (was key). We were free to race with Kyle.”

“Man, what a huge day. You know, to come here and start in the back, no practice, qualifying, get spun out, work through the field like that, just second place, it’s pretty cool.” Josh Berry is ecstatic after managing a career-best finish at the Cup Series level. Considering the comments of the sub-driver and what Jeff Gordon said about his NASCAR Cup Series chances, can you see Josh Berry securing a full-time seat in the competition in the upcoming years?

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