It was one of those days that reminded everyone just how good Joe Gibbs Racing can be. Kyle Busch led 378 of 500 laps Sunday at Bristol Motor Speedway, storming to his 10th race win in the past 38 Sprint Cup events. Denny Hamlin finished second, charging up from his 24th-place starting spot and improving six positions in points. Although rookie teammate Joey Logano blew an engine, it was still an afternoon where two championship contenders from the same organization stood out among everyone else.

Of course, the Gibbs team has been here before. The outfit placed three drivers in last year's championship Chase, led by Busch, who entered the playoff having won a series-best eight races and led the points for 17 consecutive weeks. But once there, he never had a chance. Neither did Hamlin or Tony Stewart, Logano's predecessor. Parts failures, crashes, cut tires, missed setups, speeding penalties -- they all combined to make for a miserable final 10 weeks for members of the Gibbs trio, none of whom finished any higher than eighth.

For a team with three championships, it was an unacceptable result. So in early December, the team began a series of organization-wide meetings that reviewed everything from people to processes to equipment. The reliability of car parts, the fuel efficiency of engines, the structure of how the engineering department supports the race teams -- nothing was overlooked. People were moved, policies were altered, focus was sharpened. The goal was to ensure that if Gibbs drivers make this year's Chase, they'll have the means to finish the job and claim the team's first title since 2005.

"You put a plan in place, until you see that plan come to fruition and work, you don't know," said Jimmy Makar, the team's vice president of racing operations. "But I think we're going to be able to certainly answer questions faster and take care of problems quicker."

Anything would be an improvement from last year. Busch entered the Chase as the clear favorite to win the title, but was derailed by a broken suspension piece, a blown engine and a fuel-pressure problem in the first three races. Hamlin entered in seventh, and was doomed by a drive shaft failure at Dover, a blown tire at Talladega, and a missed setup at Texas. Stewart entered 10th, and suffered a tire problem at Martinsville and crashes at Kansas, Texas and Phoenix. The Gibbs drivers wound up as the final three to qualify for places at the season-ending banquet in New York, a fact Hamlin even noted in his speech. "Yeah, eighth, ninth, 10th -- that's about the way our year's gone," he said on stage. (Continued)