Five races into the 2025 season, the NASCAR Cup Series got its first surprise winner. First, William Byron claimed victory for Chevrolet in the Daytona 500. Christopher Bell and Toyota then went on a hot streak and captured the next three races. Ford then captured its first win of 2025 on Sunday (March 16) at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, courtesy of Josh Berry and Wood Brothers Racing.
Yes, the Woods, who have not won at a 1.5-mile oval since 1993, and Berry, in only his fifth start in the No. 21, earned Ford’s first victory of the season and the 101st win in the storied history of the Wood Brothers.
Berry had a fast car and even better execution in Sunday’s race. On an afternoon when pit road penalties and loose wheels dominated the headlines, the No. 21 stayed out of the chaos. Running in the top five with 30 laps to go, Berry and the Woods had great track position but faced a questionable fuel situation. A caution for Noah Gragson’s accident on lap 244 allowed everyone to pit once more, and Berry lined up second for the restart next to Daniel Suarez. The two drivers battled for a few laps, but in the end, Berry drove away from Suarez and everyone else to score his first Cup Series victory.
“It’s just incredible. They’ve just been so good to me,” Berry said about Wood Brothers Racing. “It’s just been a great relationship. Obviously, [I] thank everybody at Wood Brothers Racing but Team Penske as well. They welcomed me with open arms and tried to help me accelerate the learning process as much as I can. I really can’t say enough for [crew chief] Miles Stanley, man. He is so good at what he’s doing, and we have a great thing going on together.”
Few fans foresaw Berry and the Wood Brothers winning together so quickly. The No. 21 team won a race with Harrison Burton last year, but they struggled mightily with Burton on a week-by-week basis for several years. Likewise, Berry showed flashes of competitiveness in 2024 with Stewart-Haas Racing, but his best results during the middle of the season were overshadowed by a disastrous end to the year, which included 18 consecutive races without a top-10 finish.
However, the building blocks of Berry’s first win were in place long before last weekend. A closer look into Berry’s history and an important decision by the Woods reveals that a Las Vegas victory may not have been such a long shot. Berry and the Wood Brothers are a perfect combination for winning at Las Vegas.
Although Berry is best known for his short track abilities, he also performed well at Las Vegas in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. He was never a winning machine in NASCAR’s second-tier division, reaching victory lane five times in 97 starts. However, two of those wins came at Las Vegas. Only his first victory, at Martinsville Speedway, was on a short track. His other two victories were at Charlotte Motor Speedway and Dover Motor Speedway, suggesting that Berry has a knack for high-speed ovals in the upper levels of stock car racing. Until Sunday, Berry’s best Cup Series results came at low-banked short ovals, following the conventional wisdom that short tracks are his strength. Yet with the No. 21 showing plenty of speed in the early weeks of 2025, it will be interesting to see where else Berry might contend for wins.
“I love this track,” Berry said post-race. “Las Vegas has been so good to me. I’ve had so many great moments here. [I] just struggled in the Next Gen car here. But man, Miles and this whole 21 team, everybody at Wood Brothers Racing, they gave me a great car today.”
Like most wins, that great car was an important part of the equation. The last time the Woods won a points-paying race on an intermediate track was at Atlanta Motor Speedway in 1993 with Morgan Shepherd driving. Longtime fans might remember that race as the one that was postponed a week by a blizzard that blanketed much of the East Coast. Berry was just two years old at the time of this race, and LVMS would not open for another three years.
However, WBR made the prescient decision in 2015 to enter a technical alliance with Team Penske. That relationship has grown closer over the past decade, and today the No. 21 Fords are built side-by-side with the Nos. 2, 12, and 22 cars in Penske’s sprawling race shop. In the modern NASCAR world, where sharing technical data can be an enormous advantage, the Woods do not have to go at it alone.
The alliance also means that the Wood Brothers car is typically fast at the tracks where Penske is strong, including Las Vegas. Prior to Sunday’s race, Penske drivers won seven of the previous 18 Cup races at Las Vegas, more than any other organization. Hendrick Motorsports has more total wins at Las Vegas, but to find its most recent seven, you would have to go back 25 prior races to 2007, instead of 2014 for Team Penske. Ford has a lot of success at Las Vegas, first with RFK Racing and now with Penske. The Wood Brothers, as long-standing Ford racers and a Penske-affiliated operation, clearly used those relationships to their benefit last weekend.
It is undoubtedly surprising that the Wood Brothers won in 2025 before any of the primary Penske cars, and that Berry has gelled with the team so quickly. Yet Sunday’s race proved that Berry and the Wood Brothers were the right combination for a Las Vegas win. With the No. 21 team on track to make the playoffs for the second year in a row, the Cup Series may be in line for more surprises from Berry and the Wood Brothers before the season is through.
Bryan began writing for Frontstretch in 2016. He has penned Up to Speed for the past eight years. A lifelong student of auto racing, Bryan is a published author and automotive historian. He is a native of Columbus, Ohio and currently resides in Southern Kentucky.