Background , the race track where the race was held.
Atlanta Motor Speedway is one of ten
intermediate tracks to hold
NASCAR races. The standard track at Atlanta Motor Speedway is a four-turn
quad-oval track that is long. The track's turns are
banked at twenty-four degrees, while the front stretch, the location of the finish line, and the
back stretch are banked at five. In the
Manufacturers' Championship,
Chevrolet was leading with 173 points, twenty-seven points ahead of their rival
Toyota.
Ford, with 110 points, was eleven points ahead of
Dodge in the battle for third.
Kasey Kahne was the race's defending champion.
Practice and qualifying Two practice sessions were held on Saturday, prior to the race. The first session lasted 120 minutes, while the second session was 45 minutes. During the first practice session,
Kasey Kahne was quickest, ahead of
Kurt Busch and
Clint Bowyer in second and third.
Jeff Burton was scored fourth quickest, while
Denny Hamlin was fifth.
David Ragan was scored in the fourth position, while Bowyer followed in fifth.
Denny Hamlin clinched his eighth career
pole position, with a time of 29.587 seconds. He was joined on the
front row by Newman.
Race The race, the twenty-fifth in the
season, began at 7:30 pm
EDT and was televised live in the United States on
ESPN.
Joe Gibbs began the pre-race ceremonies, by giving the
invocation. Next,
Ernie Haase & Signature Sound performed the
national anthem, and Terry Green,
Emory Healthcare's 500th
heart transplant recipient, gave the command for drivers to start their engines. with him with a hand gesture. One lap later, Biffle returned to the race, seventy-one laps down in the thirty-ninth position, but would lose power to his race car after four laps. After 229 laps, Stewart had a 3.9 second lead over second placed Edwards. Eleven laps later, Johnson fell to the fifth position, after being passed by Kyle Busch. On lap 243, Menard drove to pit road because of engine problems. Three laps later, Harvick moved into fifth, after passing Johnson. Then, Edwards passed Stewart to become the leader of the race. Four laps later, Edwards was on pit road, as debris from Harvick's race car, after a tire flat, prompted the fifth caution. On lap 256, Harvick drove to pit road to repair his
front bumper of his race car.
Post-race Tony Stewart appeared in victory lane after his
victory lap to start celebrating his first win of the season, and his third at
Atlanta Motor Speedway, in front of a crowd of 93,200 people. After breaking a thirty-one race losing streak, Stewart stated on the team's radio, "Ring the bell baby, woo! Good job, guys! You got it done, that's the only way we had a shot. You guys won this thing in the pits." He also added, "I've never been so happy to win in my life."
Jeff Gordon, who finished thirteenth, was second on 3,366, forty-one points ahead of
Kyle Busch and sixty-four ahead of Stewart. The race took three hours, fifty-two minutes and forty-three seconds to complete, and the margin of victory was 1.316 seconds. == Results ==