This year, Josh Berry proved he belongs in the NASCAR Cup Series. He jumped into the legendary Wood Brothers No. 21, fought tooth and nail with Daniel Suárez at Las Vegas, and parked it in Victory Lane for his first Cup win. Along the way, he led 207 laps, scored three top fives and eight top tens across 36 races. With this boost, he sets his aim on his roots again.

His Cup performance was not bad for a guy who spent most of his life chasing checkered flags on little bullrings. But after a long rookie season full of big highs and a few hard crashes, Berry is heading right back to where it all started: late model stock cars.

Josh Berry can’t wait to “raise the Late Model stock” again

Standing in the garage before practice, Berry was all smiles, talking about finally getting a weekend away from the Cup grind.

“Yeah I know it’s fine, obviously had a busy year and this is the first opportunity I’ve had to raise the late model stock this year, really, and it’s always fun to come back here and race and I won this race a couple times. Had some success here and it’s just it’s a fun one to come race with.”

You could hear the relief in his voice. After thirty-six Cup points races, the chance to climb back into a heavy, loud late model felt like coming home.

He didn’t stop there. “Really enjoyed racing with these guys and a 17 car. Kenneth and everybody on Thomas Racing. They’d a great job. Last year we went to Florence, had a lot of fun, and want to do it again.”

That’s Josh Berry all the way: quick to thank the people who have stuck with him since the beginning. Kenneth and Thomas Racing is the same group that put him in good cars long before anyone outside the short track world knew his name. Even now, with a Cup trophy on the shelf, he still jumps at the chance to drive their stuff.

Then he got reflective. “I know it’s a lot of fun. I mean that’s such a big deal when in the Cup Series, man really just such a journey to get there and obviously accomplish that was really huge, and honestly had a lot of good runs throughout the season too as well.”

He wasn’t bragging; he was just stating facts. From go karts to JR Motorsports late models to Xfinity wins to finally beating the best in the world at Las Vegas, the climb took years of Saturday nights on half miles exactly like the one he’s running this weekend. The Cup win felt massive, but sliding a late model sideways still feels like the purest kind of racing there is.

He’s already looking ahead to 2026, too.

“We’re excited to keep our basically the same group and go back and have a year on our belt and hopefully find our way back in victory lane.”

He loves the continuity at Wood Brothers: same crew chief, same core guys, same Penske alliance. One full season together gave them speed; another should give them wins.

And when someone asked if the Cup schedule makes these late model weekends tougher, Berry just shrugged.

“Yeah, I don’t know that it’ll change too much. I mean that’s something that we fought. We’ve done here with the schedule. Obviously, there’s a lot of early morning practice and typically we end up racing in the afternoon to the evening.”

He’s used to it: roll in after a Cup race, unload at dawn, qualify, race till dark, then do it again Sunday. No complaints, just part of the deal when you refuse to let go of the racing that raised you.

Finally, he laid out the simple truth for the long race ahead.

“It’ll just be a little slick on new tires cold temperatures but once we get going I feel like it’ll be pretty normal. And yeah, we just need to hit us. Have a good car. That’s a long race Sunday, so just have to have a good balance.”

Twenty-one late-model wins, a Martinsville grandfather clock, and a Cup trophy later, Josh Berry still breaks racing down to the same basics he learned as a teenager: stay clean early, save your stuff, and have a car that turns when the track gets slick. Everything else is noise.

Keelan Harvick steps into the same world Berry is going to

While Berry is going back to recharge, thirteen-year-old Keelan Harvick is stepping up to the very same kind of car at the Thanksgiving Classic. He already has a stack of Legend Car wins at Southern National, but this Sunday he’ll run the full 250-lap Late Model Stock headliner.

Fresh off a top five in the crazy South Carolina 400 at Florence (where he started second, got caught in someone else’s mess, and still came home fifth), Keelan says the biggest lesson was tire management. That will matter even more over 250 green flag laps.

His goal is straightforward: “Complete all the laps and learn as much as I can.”

No pressure, just progress. From a veteran who just won in Cup and still needs his late model fix to a kid taking his first big swing in the same machinery that built drivers like Berry, the circle stays unbroken. Same cars, same passion, same dream.