Story By: A2DPR / AUSTIN BERRY RACING – PORT ROYAL, PA – The calendar turned to June on Saturday yet for Austin Berry it still felt like the beginning of the 2024 season. His season started late due to parts delays and there was a mix of good and bad news on his first two race nights.
Appalachian Mountain Speedweek was fast approaching and Berry needed to find a rhythm and find it quick.
A COMPLETE NIGHT
Berry’s pill draw Saturday night put him on the outside front row for his heat race and he took full advantage early on, jumping out to a five-car-length lead by the end of lap one.
Berry endured three restarts before two laps could be completed. Each caution erased a comfortable lead and bunched the field. Meanwhile 8th-starting Rick Eckert had a good car as well and was cashing in on the restarts. He took the lead away before the halfway point and Berry settled for a runner-up finish.
The 25-lap main event saw Berry take the green from outside row six. He found himself in a heated battle with Gregg Satterlee, Shaun Jones, and others for the majority of the event.
Berry ran 11th in the middle segment of the finale but could not quite crack the top ten. He eventually closed out the night in 14th.
“I’m happy to get a full night in. Our season started late, we had troubles the first night out, then we started good at Bridgeport but couldn’t close out the night.”, Berry commented. “I’m glad we got this run under our belt before we take on Speedweek.”
“It’s not easy here. The competition is deep. You have to really be on to move forward here. No excuses. We weren’t good enough tonight but our car was good. It was all about track position and dirty air. I feel like we were good enough to run near the front if we had started up there.”
UP NEXT
Berry will tackle the entire 8-race slate of Appalachian Mountain Speedweek for super late models beginning this Friday night, June 7th.