After making the playoffs for the first time in his career, Josh Berry entered WWT Raceway hoping to rebound from a difficult outing at Darlington. After qualifying third for the Southern 500, he crashed on the opening lap.
The wreck left him at the bottom of the standings, 19 points below the cut line. At Gateway, he was running solid in the early laps, up in 15th place. However, before the end of Stage 1, contact from Chase Elliott sent him spinning into the outside wall.
Berry sustained significant damage and immediately went to the garage. Unlike Darlington, where he returned to the race after spending over 120 laps in the garage, Berry will not get back out on track at Gateway.
“Obviously, it was a chaotic restart back there after everybody pitted,” said Berry after being released from the infield care center. “We got checked up a little bit to try and stay off Joey [Logano], and the 9 [Elliott] got a run and slid in there. It looked like he got a little loose and slid up into us. I’m gonna be honest, Chase and that team have done a lot for me and I really doubt that was on purpose. Just wrong place, wrong time for us again.”
The damage was too severe, and the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford will finish 36th, scoring one point. This will be Berry’s sixth DNF of the 2025 season.
As a result of the wreck, Berry will almost certainly face a must-win situation at Bristol, or face elimination in the opening round of the playoffs.
As for the battle that is now ahead of him, Berry said: “We’ll do the best we can, put ourselves in position to race for a win and that’s about all we can do at this point.”
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