HAMPTON, Ga. -- Kasey Kahne didn't just finish fourth Sunday in the Folds of Honor 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

He finished fourth in a race where he spent much of it a lap down.

Kahne knows what it's like to struggle in a race. Look at last year, a season when a race such as the one he had Sunday likely would have resulted in a much worse finish. At the end of Sunday's race, Kahne had a top-five car, a far cry from the start of the race. A year ago, he would have likely had a 15th-place car at the end of the race.

"Last year, we never really figured out how to get better a lot of times in races," Kahne said. "At the end of the year, we did a better job of it, but we also started better in those final 12 races and had better cars when the green flag came out.

"Today, we didn't and then the guys put their heads together and really turned it around. That was a huge improvement."

The fourth-place finish could be a sign that staying the course with the Kahne pairing with crew chief Keith Rodden was a smart move. After missing the playoffs last year, Hendrick Motorsports could easily have made a change in crew chief (and, frankly, few would have been shocked with a driver change as well).

"In the first 50 laps of the race, I was thinking, 'Oh my gosh, it feels just like last year,' " Kahne said. "But then suddenly we figured out how to fix it and that was awesome."

What changed?

Kasey Kahne is off to a strong start in 2017. Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images

"I think I probably gave better feedback," Kahne said. "I think Keith did a really nice job of listening to me and then making the right adjustments for what I was talking about. We don't always do that so that was a big deal.

"We have to understand why we did it right today and do it again next time."

Of course, Kahne hopes that in the coming races he starts out much stronger. But teams that challenge for wins and the championship learn to turn potentially bad days into good ones.

Kahne sits ninth in the standings thanks to a seventh-place finish at Daytona and then the fourth at Atlanta. In neither race did he earn any points awarded to the top-10 drivers at the end of the first two initial stages.

"What we've done the first two weeks is much better than what we did last year or the year before," Kahne said. "It feels really good to do that. We just have to keep pushing in the same areas."

Xfinity Series: A different Bubba?

Darrell Wallace Jr. finished sixth in the Xfinity race at Atlanta, a big finish for the Roush Fenway Racing driver who still needs funding to run the entire season.

Darrell Wallace Jr. kept scrapping Saturday and wound up with a sixth-place finish. Daniel Shirey/Getty Images

After getting in a wreck at Daytona, Wallace needed a good finish at Atlanta. It wasn't easy, but he persevered and was the second-best Xfinity Series regular in the running order.

"We have a new attitude at the shop and we are all about not giving up," Wallace said. "Watching Ryan [Reed] last weekend spin out twice ... and came back to win it [at Daytona], it was about not giving up.

"[Our attitude is] don't give up on the team or the car and things will hopefully play out in your favor. We were able to capitalize on that [late] restart and make the most of it. We didn't have the speed to run with these guys so we really had to work for it there."

Camping World Truck Series: As the Bell tolls

Christopher Bell made the Camping World Truck Series championship round last year, but he felt he should have won more than one race.

Christopher Bell, who won once last season, got his first win of 2017 out of the way early. Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images

So earning a win in the second race of the season is exactly what he viewed as necessary to set the tone for 2017. His victory at Atlanta wasn't just any other win -- he swept the two stages, found himself as far back as sixth because of the slow outside lane on restarts and then easily took the lead after a few more cautions allowed him to mount a comeback.

Last year, Bell had wrecks at Daytona and Atlanta and then struggled at Martinsville. He won at Gateway later in the year but that slow start seemed to hang on him like a parachute.

"Starting off with good momentum and good results is huge for us," Bell said.

There was no luck in this one.

"It was just kind of a dream weekend ever since we unloaded," Bell said. "We were really, really fast right off the truck and everything we did to it just made it better and better and better throughout practice.

"As soon as they dropped the green in the race, it was just really, really good."