Johnson wins and closes the gap

Jimmie Johnson won at Atlanta and closed to within 9 points of Jeff Gordon, also in the top five were Edwards, Sorenson, Kenseth and Jeff Burton.  Vickers was the top Toyota finisher in 10th followed by Waltrip in 11th.

The race was slowed by 14 cautions, including a red flag when Gilliland and Martin got together, both were ok after the hard impact, but their cars were trashed.  Most of the cautions seemed to be tire problems, with an engine problem or two thrown in, except for the Gilliland/Martin wreck and the last two cautions.

Hamlin ran out of fuel on the restart on lap 322 and Martin Truex ran right into the back of him hard, wrecking his chances for the win.  Jeff Burton, Jamie McMurray and Kyle Busch also got some damage during the melee, but were able to continue.  That set up a green-white-checkered finish that unfortunately ended under yellow.  On the restart, Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s rear tire came off and he went up into the wall hard, collecting McMurray in the process, talk about a fluke thing, not sure if something broke on the car or if the wheel may have been left loose during the last stop.

Of course, the finish wasn't the biggest controversy of the race, that came after the caution before when Hamlin ran out of fuel, it seems that not everyone was happy or understood where they should be on the restart and the lineup was a bit jumbled because of it, but that's NASCAR for ya, I won't repeat what I heard one driver say about it over the radio.

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