Winners & Losers at Atlanta 2

Winners   By Tom Luttermoser. Image Via AMS Twitter.

Chase Elliott - Nothing is sweeter than winning at home. It took Chase 9 tries to win at his home track in the Cup Series, 12 total between the Top-3 series. Chase joins his father Awesome Bill from Dawsonville as being only the second Georgia native to ever win there. Chase dominated scoring maximum points winning both stages and leading a race high 96 laps in rout to his 3rd win of the season. He battled hard with Corey LaJoie in the final restart and the closing laps winning the race under caution for his first ever win at home.

Corey LaJoie - Corey has been one of the fan favorites for the last few years in the Cup series. Last season he moved to the Spire Motorsports #7 entry and scored his first career Top-5 earlier this season at Atlanta. He announced that Sunday's Atlanta race would be his best shot at a "Hail Mary" to win and make the Playoffs. He made his presence known Sunday leading 19 laps late in the race and battling hard with Cup Champion Chase Elliott, a last lap up-high block by Elliott put Corey into the outside wall. His 21st place finish in no way described his day. It was a valiant effort by the team and driver and more importantly showed, if you can get him up front... He belongs there. 

Erik Jones - That Jones Boy showed once again this season he belongs in the Cup Series and that PettyGMS can be a force. Jones led 10 laps and scored his 6th Top-10 and 2nd Top-5 of the season already matching the entirety of last season for Top-10s. The team constantly has speed and has shown they can be competitive, especially at the faster tracks. Look for places like Michigan and Daytona could be shining points in the upcoming schedule to get the PettyGMS pairing their first win and the first race win for the Petty name since 2014.

Losers  Image Via Broadcast photo

Christopher Bell - Bell, whos pit crew was just shaken up by Joe Gibbs Racing with several members switched up with Bubba Wallace got the short end of the stick on Sunday when Wallace's abysmal pit crew screwed up their first outing with the young Gibbs driver. on pit road, the jack dropped... and so did the rear left wheel that appeared to not be attached at all. I do give credit though at the tire changer did cling to the wheel and was nearly dragged out of the pit box. Bell qualified 15th and ran in the Top-10 even scoring 6 stage points. Bell spun out of 6th position in turn 4 going through the grass bringing out the caution on lap 235 when the wheel fell off  during the stop and was relegated back to the mid-20s for the remainder of the race. This had a big impact on his playoff standings as now he is only safe by 18 points of Kevin Harvick. 

Kyle Busch - At one time Kyle Busch was 2nd in the points only a handful of points behind leader Chase Elliott, fresh off his win at Bristol... Consistent.. and then.. Chaos. 4 races 20th or worse. Busch raced his way from a 19th place starting spot to the Top-5 scoring 5 stage points. He was then collected by an early caution on lap 91. He did finish the race.. with a finishing place of 20th which was the only glimmer of the race for the Candy Man.

Denny Hamlin - He led 2 laps and scored 3 stage points just to, once again, be taken out of the fight by a Ross Chastain move. Chastain came up the track taking Denny out of contention from 4th position. After the race, Denny stated "I'm at my peak" referring to his tolerance for Chastain's "overly" aggressive driving style. Ross would go on to a runner up finish and Hamlin was relegated back to a 25th place finish.