Josh Berry and Dale Earnhardt Jr are a match made in heaven. The 2-time Xfinity Series champion has been vital to Berry’s progress in NASCAR. Providing Berry a launchpad with the CARS Tour made some big guns of the sport notice his talents, and here we are. The competition’s executive director, Kip Childress, agrees.

Childress professes his appreciation for Berry’s steady evolution through the lower levels of NASCAR to the top flight. With the 2024 season approaching faster than ever, Berry has yet again returned to late-model racing, this time with his predecessor, Kevin Harvick. Succeeding the veteran in SHR’s #4 Ford is going to invite expectations, and Berry has gone back to his roots to prepare.

Kip Childress believes the CARS Tour has been carving a name for itself at the grassroots level

After years of shining in the JRM Late Model Program, Josh Berry clinched six Legend Car championship wins. In his next big move, he claimed the CARS Tour Late Model Stock Tour in 2017. That season shed light on his abilities after he notched up 22 wins in 52 starts for Dale Earnhardt Jr. Having looked at Berry’s rise from the bottom up, Kip Childress has a deep understanding of what that entails for the CARS Tour and upcoming talents.

Speaking about the same, the executive director said, “Josh Berry is a very recent graduate of our series, and he is the next example of someone who is now going to be a full-time Cup Series competitor. If you’d be asking that 5-6 years ago, he’d have probably looked at you like you had a third eye in your head. So we are looking forward to where those next Josh Berrys are coming from.”

The CARS Tour has also been a platform for promising youngsters who are possibly the future generation of NASCAR stars. Childress adds that the series owners in the sport have been equally important: “Those four guys [Dale Earnhardt Jr, Jeff Burton, Kevin Harvick, and Justin Marks] that are series owners right now, they fit into that right. While Josh is climbing the ladder, these guys are certainly backed that we stay strong.

“I mean to some extent you could say that I’m an example of that. This is where I got my start. The very first races where I was an official was at the Caraway Speedway. That is where we were going to crown our champion this weekend.”

Making another major reveal, Childress said, “We went to Track County Speedway, and I remember watching races at Hickory as a kid and races at Orange County, which we are going to get on our schedule.”

Josh Berry has already had his first moments of action in the Cup Series. Coming in to cover for the Hendrick Motorsports #9 car also helped Rick Hendrick add another contender to the owners’ championship race.

Josh Berry, the finest graduate of Dale Earnhardt Jr’s Late Model Program

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Josh Berry and Dale Earnhardt Jr’s story stopped in 2023 when Stewart-Haas Racing announced Berry’s addition to the team. Berry ran a JRM car 76 times in Xfinity and secured five wins. He came close to winning the championship last season, eventually settling for fourth place.

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“It is a testament that this is a great opportunity for young drivers, crew members, and young officials,” continued Childress, commending the influence of the opportunity that Berry has had in his career. “This needs to be one of the steps. If it is your desire to climb all the way up, I feel like it is a job of ours to help you do that as best as we can. Again, Josh is one of those examples.”

With his transition to the #4 team in motion, the expectations will always find a place in the conversation. Berry has all the right tools to fulfill the demands of the #4 team, and his fans would want him to build upon his successes in the CARS Tour and Xfinity Series.

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