One of the favorites heading into this year's Chase, Kyle Busch led the field to the green for the second week in a row after Friday's qualifying was rained out. Once the green flag flew, Busch held on to the top spot for only three laps before sliding back. The kid they call "Rowdy" loves to drive a loose race car, but Sunday was something even Busch could not handle.

Falling further and further back, Busch and his Joe Gibbs Racing team quickly realized there were bigger issues. An apparent problem with the left front sway bar was causing the body to travel when Busch went through the corners. With a scheduled competition caution planned at Lap 35, the only thing crew chief Steve Addington could do was tell his driver to hold on and try not to get lapped.

Once the yellow flew on Lap 35, Busch had fallen out of the top-20 and headed straight to pit road for repairs. A broken bolt used to connect the sway bar to the lower control arm was the problem for the No. 18 team, which scrambled to make the repair while keeping an eye on staying ahead of the pace car. Coming into the pits a second time, Busch sped up to the front of the field to better his chances of staying on the lead lap. NASCAR saw the move and penalized Busch one lap for the illegal move.

"We had a part failure and it's one of those things -- you can't do nothing about," crew chief Steve Addington explained following the race. "We weren't very good when we unloaded here, but we felt like we did the right things and were going to have a good race car. Part failure cost us so we'll just have to go back and re-evaluate."

Busch restarted the race on Lap 40 from the 43rd-spot, one lap down to the rest of the field. With the problem not really fixed, Busch continued to struggle to hang on to his Toyota Camry. One of the best wheelmen in the series, Busch lost control of the No. 18 coming off Turn 2 on Lap 83.  Busch was able to keep his car off the wall, but could do nothing as Jamie McMurray slid hard into the right rear of Busch's car.

Not a factor the rest of the day, Busch?s points lead evaporated after finishing 34th. The eighty point advantage Busch had going into Sunday's event turned into a seventy-four point disadvantage as he dropped seven spots in the series standings to eight.

Finding himself out of the top spot for the first time since Talladega in April, Busch is hoping to rebound next week at Dover. Busch took the top-spot at Dover earlier this year at June and hopes to make it a clean sweep at the Monster Mile. Despite this weekend's setback, most agree you can afford one "mulligan" in the Chase and for Busch Dover should be a welcomed sight.