Avondale, Arizona – Hoping to become the first Oklahoma native to compete in a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race since the early 1980s, Tanner Berryhill will have to wait to update that statistic, as he failed to qualify for Sunday’s CampingWorld.com 500 at Phoenix (Ariz.) International Raceway.
Berryhill, the NASCAR XFINITY Series regular was offered to drive the No. 66 for Premium Motorsports Chevrolet after Mike Wallace and the Jay Robinson-owned team parted ways after failing to qualify for last weekend’s event at Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway.
When practice began on Friday afternoon, Berryhill quickly jumped into a safe range insinuating that the team’s streak of failing to qualify for three consecutive Sprint Cup races could come to a halt.
However, as the session pressed on, Berryhill dropped in the rundown and fell to last overall, nearly a second and a half behind session leader Joey Logano.
The Bixby, Oklahoma native admitted he was surprised where he ended up following practice, but said he dealt with an extremely tight condition in his No. 66 Chevrolet – a condition that could hinder him in qualifying.
It did.
Despite a valiant effort, Berryhill made two attempts to make the show during the first round of knockout qualifying. He improved his time by nearly two-tenths of a second though it only netted him the 43rd quickest lap overall – well out of range of the safety net of qualifying inside the top-36.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity with Premium Motorsports,” said Berryhill. “It’s a good group of guys and they have a lot of potential. There’s some key areas that need improvement, but when they figure that out, I feel like they have a good shot of being a breakout independent team.
“It was a tall task for us to come to Phoenix and make this race. We gave it our all, but we unloaded a little farther off than we wanted to be. I learned a lot though. The car was better in qualifying and we found some speed, it just wasn’t (good) enough.”
With the shutdown of his family-owned NASCAR XFINITY Series team Vision Racing after failing to qualify for the season-opening race at Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway last month, Berryhill’s future is bleak, but the 21-year old is hopeful for another shot in Robinson’s car at an upcoming event.
“I’m not sure what’s next, but I’m going to keep digging. I’m a racer and NASCAR is where I want to be.”
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
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