Berry, a regular in the Xfinity Series, has been subbing for an injured Chase Elliott at oval tracks since Las Vegas.
The 32-year-old made his fourth appearance behind the wheel of the No. 9 Chevrolet at Richmond, and at first, it was a struggle. He started deep in the field and forward progress proved difficult.
While his Hendrick Motorsports teammates dominated large portions of the race, he was left to fight through the mid-field. He even went for a spin during the second stage, with help from Ryan Blaney.
Berry wasn't alone at the No. 9 HMS team in his role of a substitute. Interim crew chief Tom Grey is standing in for regular crew chief Alan Gustafson, who is serving his four-race suspension after Hendrick Motorsports was found to have modified single-source supplied parts.
Grey made a gutsy call to run long during the final stint of the race, hoping for an advantageous caution to gain some track position. They got just that and Berry suddenly found himself in a position to contend for the race win.
Berry restarted on the front row beside Kyle Larson, and although he was unable to challenge the former Cup Series champion, he held strong in second position.
Ultimately, he brought home a runner-up result, shattering his previous best result of tenth at Phoenix.
"Man, this is really cool," said Berry post-race, who was all smiles. "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.”
Gordon impressed by Berry's performance
Jeff Gordon, the Vice Chairman of Hendrick Motorsports, had nothing but praise for Berry after the race.
"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 adjustment there early 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.
"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 start to come together. And every time I'm scanning, I kept hearing by the end of the run, Hey, those lap times are really good. Hey, those lap times are similar to the leaders'.
"So he clearly knows how to manage tires and manage a race well. It seems like the longer the race, the better he does. We're really happy with the job that he has done.
Gordon went even further, believing Berry has a future at the Cup level.
"Certainly everybody has known his talent watching him in other forms of racing, late models, and the Xfinity Series," he continued. "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."
