FONTANA, Calif. -- After the best run of his short Nextel Cup career, J.J. Yeley was worried he had ticked off a former Nextel Cup champion late in the Auto Club 500 at California.

With just 25 laps to go, Yeley was running in the middle of a three-wide pack when he clipped Kurt Busch, sending Busch across the track into a pack of cars. Kevin Harvick came within an eyelash of smashing into Busch at 150 mph.

"We were lucky that we didn't get hit as we spun," Busch said. "I was holding on [saying], 'Don't hit me, don't hit me!' And we made it through."

Busch wasn't mad at Yeley -- "It wasn't his fault," he said -- but he was intensely frustrated with how his Dodge handled in his first 500-mile downforce race with Penske Racing.

"We were all bunched up going into Turn 3," said Yeley, who finished eighth. "Bobby Labonte got a good run and dove underneath me and chopped me up the track and got me real loose.

"I just barely touched [Busch] in the left rear as I was sliding up the racetrack. I wanted to make sure I apologized to him over the radio."

Busch had won the pole Friday with a blistering lap that left his peers shaking their heads, but that lap didn't compare at all to the balky car he drove Sunday.

Busch was one of three Dodge drivers who drove an Intrepid at California. Busch was the only one of the three to finish on the lead lap, while Casey Mears and Kasey Kahne both cracked the top 10 in Chargers.

"[We] just need to build a little bit more downforce into it and try to keep the front valance on it," said Busch, who finished 16th. "We went to way too soft of a spring and that hurt our chances. It was good for one lap. It just hurt us on the short run."

On the other side of the coin, Yeley enjoyed a career day. Yeley had made just seven career starts in the Nextel Cup Series and had never finished on the lead lap.

Yeley's season had gotten off to a bad start in the Daytona 500, when he was caught up in an early wreck that limited him to just 157 laps.

His Chevrolet was tight in the center of the turns at California, forcing Yeley to run the high line for much of the 250 laps. Still, he spent nearly half of the race riding in the top 10.

"The car was neutral all day but the car was fast," said Yeley, who was the lone rookie in the top 10. "We were never too worried about it."

The run gives Yeley a glimmer of hope that the team can run well on the intermediate tracks, which make up a majority of the races on the Nextel Cup schedule.

[Crew chief Steve Addington] said that was a hell of a job and that team is looking forward to the entire season," Yeley said.