LOUDON, N.H. -- Once defending Lenox Industrial Tools 301 champion Kurt Busch accepted that a rain shower that was expected all day Sunday had forced him into third place at New Hampshire Motor Speedway behind Joey Logano and Jeff Gordon he was able to celebrate the day's positives.

Significantly, Busch's fifth top-five and ninth top-10 finish in 17 races kept him fourth in the standings, with nine races remaining until the cutoff for the Chase. A year ago, after winning this race Busch went into a tailspin that left him 18th in the standings, with 10 top-10s total.

“

It was funny, the fact that [Gordon] thought that those cars were lapped cars, because we thought the same thing. ... I thought I was just aiming for [Gordon].

”

-- KURT BUSCH

"Overall, last year, to drive into Victory Lane and do it in a rain-shortened race and [Sunday] to have it where we were fast enough to win and not get the win, you know, that's how this sport evens itself out," Busch said. "You have your good and your bad luck, and overall it was a great run.

"It was a solid day for us. I felt like we made good adjustments in the pits and overall, my biggest downside was restarts, slipping the tires and getting forward bite going through the gears. I just couldn't get the car to stay low. And then with our pit crew, we had some off stops.

"But when the time came to push hard, the car was there and the crew gave me a great stop and we were reeling in what I thought was the leader [Gordon], and at the same time, [Gordon's crew chief Steve] Letarte told him he was in second, and Pat [Tryson, Busch's crew chief] told me I was third.

"It was as if he just took the wind out of the sails. The rain was there and I was catching Jeff, but we just ran out of time."

The 60 percent chance of rain that took until 268 of 300 laps had been run interrupted a green flag pit sequence in which Gordon and Busch had cycled back to where they were running second and third, respectively.

After the leaders pitted at Lap 235, the final strategy was set when Logano and seven other drivers who were in that position due to a variety of problems elected not to stop. At Lap 248, Busch was 1.453 seconds behind Gordon, but in three laps Busch had cut it to just .151 seconds. The margin fluctuated until they caught traffic. (Continued)