HAMPTON, Ga. -- Kyle Busch is back in the Chase. But Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway, he took a circuitous route to get there.

The Joe Gibbs Racing driver fell a lap down after a problematic pit stop on Lap 49 left him with both a speeding penalty and a loose left-rear wheel. He faded as far back as 34th, and at one point was the last car a lap down. But Busch used the free pass to get back on the lead lap and salvage a strong fifth-place finish that locked him into NASCAR's year-end playoff for the first time since 2008.

Double trouble

Kyle Busch overcomes early troubles in the pits to salvage a top-five finish at Atlanta.

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“

It was a hard-fought battle, and that's what it's going to take the next 10 races, is to come back like this.

”

-- KYLE BUSCH

"It was a hard-fought battle, and that's what it's going to take the next 10 races, is to come back like this," Busch said. "We have good cars, and we had a great race car [Sunday]. It was really fast in the early portion of the race, and some guys made some adjustments and got a little bit better than we did. We never really picked up any time, we just kind of bounced back and forth with the balance of the car. ... Hopefully we can go out and carry this momentum into next week and have another strong run at Richmond, then go after these final 10."

Busch was last in the Chase two years ago, when he won a series-high eight races and started the playoff as the top seed. His championship bid was derailed by mechanical issues in the first two events. The driver of the No. 18 car missed the Chase last season despite winning four times, and that 13th-place points finish eventually led to a crew chief change with Dave Rogers replacing Steve Addington.

Sunday night, Busch and Rogers accomplished job one. Busch needed a finish of only 40th or better to secure his Chase bid, which occurred when the third car -- that of teammate Denny Hamlin, disabled with a blown engine -- fell out of the event. "It is a relief to be locked in to the Chase," Rogers said. "That was our first goal of the year, so goal accomplished. Now we're going to go work on that bigger goal."

It was, though, something of an adventure getting there, all of it stemming from the pit stop on Lap 49. NASCAR ticketed Busch for being too fast entering the pits, which forced him to serve a pass-through penalty that sent him a lap down. On that same stop, Rogers said, the rear-tire changer had a gun issue that prevented him from getting the wheel on tight. Sure enough, Busch soon reported a loose wheel that necessitated an unscheduled pit stop to fix.

"Fortunately, it did happen early in the race, so we knew we had time to rebound," Rogers said. "One thing we've been working on is just trying to handle things as they come. No matter what, if you panic, you're going to make the situation much worse. I'm really proud of all the guys, really proud of Kyle for making kind of light of it, the best he can for the circumstances. He just got all he could out of it. We knew we had a fast race car."

Fast enough that by the late stages of the race, Busch was running among the leaders. But the early pit issues left the No. 18 off-sequence with the competition in terms of tires, which made it difficult for Rogers and his team to gauge what other frontrunner's were doing to their cars. Busch's vehicle also had been set up to prefer long runs -- of which there were plenty Sunday at Atlanta -- but cautions turned the end into a series of short sprints. Still, no one seemed too disappointed in the outcome.

"We fought through a lot," Busch said. "We just could never get the car exactly the way I wanted it. We battled hard and made some good adjustments. We came from almost two laps down [Sunday] and got back on the lead lap. Have to thank Dave and the guys on pit road for good pit stops. What more could you ask for, I guess?"

Added Rogers: "We struggled here in the spring, came back and got a top-five, struggled at Bristol, came back and got a win there. Kyle and I are both competitive, and it's frustrating, because you want to win. But you've got to be realistic and say, top-five after everything that happened [Sunday], we'll take it. We'll go on to Richmond where we know we can race really well and contend for the win, and go from there."

Being locked in before next week's regular-season finale at Richmond will allow the No. 18 team to try some setup tactics in preparation for the Chase opener at New Hampshire, Rogers said. But don't expect any big swings.

"We're really not going to change at all," Rogers said. "We're going to go to Richmond and work on some things for Loudon. But we're not the kind of team that throws a whole new setup at it. We methodically try to improve our car every single week, so we're going to go to Richmond with a few ideas we think will work at Loudon. We'll try them. If they work, great, we'll race them. If not, we'll take them out and go back to similar to what we were in the spring."