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Kurt Busch wins at Atlanta

Kurt Busch fended off Matt Kenseth and Juan Pablo Montoya to claim his first win of the season in the Kobalt Tools 500 at Atlanta

The Penske driver, along with Richard Petty's Kasey Kahne, were dominant throughout the race, alternating the lead between them for most of the afternoon. However, Busch's pit crew was key in putting him up front when it counted, while Kahne's stops were not as quick - and neither was his pace on short runs.

This boosted Busch, who reclaimed the lead front Kahne following four-tyre stops from the leaders under the eighth caution of the day with 34 laps to go. As the green flag waved Earnhardt Ganassi's Montoya emerged as the main challenger to Busch and after moving up to second he continuously closed on the leading #2 Dodge.

The Colombian seemed set to arrive on the rear bumper of Busch for a thrilling final two laps, but the yellow flag brought that to an end as Brad Keselowski's car flipped over on the front stretch following contact with Carl Edwards, as the Roush Fenway racer apparently got payback from a previous incident with the Penske driver.

Keselowski came out unscathed from his battered car, while Edwards was parked by NASCAR and called to give his account of the incident to officials.

The race resumed with a first attempt at a green-white-chequered finish that was hampered by an incident triggered by contact between Jamie McMurray and Clint Bowyer, with at least another five cars getting caught up in the wreckage, right before the white flag was about to wave for the leaders.

Busch and Montoya had already charged back up front from fourth and fifth on the restart, after three other cars had jumped them in the final stop by taking two new tyres only.

On the final restart, Montoya seemed to spin his tyres under power, allowing Busch to get the jump on him. The Colombian eventually dropped back to fourth place while Busch had to watch out for Roush Fenway's Kenseth, who followed him across the finish line in the end.

Montoya was third ahead of Kahne, who led the most laps, while Paul Menard's two-tyre gamble in the end paid dividends as he held on to fifth at the flag, followed by his team-mate AJ Allmendinger, as three RPM cars finished in the top six.

Points leader Kevin Harvick struggled for the first half of the race but the right set-up changes and strategy calls allowed him to score his fourth top ten finish in as many races this year, despite his Richard Childress Racing squad not looking anywhere near as strong as in the past three weeks.

Reigning champion Jimmie Johnson ran a solid race but missed his mark in one of his final stops and then made contact with Stewart Haas' Ryan Newman, damaging the right-front fender of his car and causing an extra stop for repairs near the end. Despite that he was the best among the Hendrick Motorsports cars in 12th as all his team-mates suffered with tyre-related issues.

Pos  Driver              Car        Laps
 1.  Kurt Busch          Dodge      341
 2.  Matt Kenseth        Ford       341
 3.  Juan Pablo Montoya  Chevrolet  341
 4.  Kasey Kahne         Ford       341
 5.  Paul Menard         Ford       341
 6.  AJ Allmendinger     Ford       341
 7.  Brian Vickers       Toyota     341
 8.  Greg Biffle         Ford       341
 9.  Kevin Harvick       Chevrolet  341
10.  Scott Speed         Toyota     341
11.  Marcos Ambrose      Toyota     341
12.  Jimmie Johnson      Chevrolet  341
13.  Tony Stewart        Chevrolet  341
14.  Regan Smith         Chevrolet  341
15.  Dale Earnhardt Jr   Chevrolet  341
16.  Bill Elliott        Ford       341
17.  Ryan Newman         Chevrolet  341
18.  Jeff Gordon         Chevrolet  341
19.  Elliott Sadler      Ford       341
20.  Jeff Burton         Chevrolet  341
21.  Denny Hamlin        Toyota     341
22.  Bobby Labonte       Chevrolet  341
23.  Clint Bowyer        Chevrolet  341
24.  Mike Bliss          Chevrolet  341
25.  Kyle Busch          Toyota     341
26.  David Gilliland     Ford       341
27.  Martin Truex Jr     Toyota     341
28.  Sam Hornish Jr      Dodge      340
29.  Jamie McMurray      Chevrolet  340
30.  Travis Kvapil       Ford       339
31.  Kevin Conway        Ford       334
32.  Boris Said          Ford       333
33.  Mark Martin         Chevrolet  331
34.  Max Papis           Toyota     329
35.  Joey Logano         Toyota     323
36.  Brad Keselowski     Dodge      322
37.  David Ragan         Ford       211
38.  Joe Nemechek        Toyota     175
39.  Carl Edwards        Ford       170
40.  David Reutimann     Toyota     167
41.  Dave Blaney         Toyota     48
42.  Michael McDowell    Toyota     37
43.  Robby Gordon        Toyota     3

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