As I was going through the history of the Sprint Cup Series at Infineon Raceway for this week’s look back, I was reminded of how one mistake can cost you more than just the win and how that seems to be the story of this season. One driver who is running very well this season fell short of victory just one year ago in Sonoma. A costly mistake by Marcos Ambrose gave way to Jimmie Johnson scoring his first career road course win.

Defending race winner Kasey Kahne secured the pole with a lap around the 1.99-mile track at an average speed of 93.893 mph. Jimmie Johnson qualified on the outside front row followed by Kurt Busch, Kevin Harvick and Jeff Gordon.

Johnson was good all day long as he took the lead from Kasey Kahne on lap one and stretched it to a five second advantage by lap 10. This was a tough day for Joe Gibbs Racing as Kyle Busch got into a wreck with Elliott Sadler, A. J. Allmendinger, Clint Bowyer and Jamie McMurray to bring out the first caution on lap 12. While Busch was in the garage getting a new nose put on the car, his teammate Denny Hamlin damaged his nose by running into Boris Said on the restart putting both cars out of contention.

Brad Keselowski spun in Turn 7 bringing out the final caution of the day on lap 103, a caution Ambrose wishes never happened. Ambrose, in fuel saving mode, cut his engine off and coasted under the yellow only to have his car stall while going uphill. NASCAR ruled that he did not maintain track position as the leader and was placed seventh in line on the restart, costing him the win.

Johnson went on to claim the win with Robby Gordon, Kasey Kahne, Kevin Harvick and Jeff Gordon rounding out the top five.

"I feel bad for him. It was definitely a gift kind of handed to us," said Johnson. “You can count on some guys making mistakes, but I didn’t think Marcos would make one. To see him make that was totally off the wall."

Ambrose was clearly disappointed with NASCAR's decision.

“It’s NASCAR’s house and I’ll always play by the rules,” Ambrose said. “I don’t agree with it, I don’t like it, and that’s only because I lost the race.”

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