LONG POND, Pa. — With pit strategy so critical at Pocono Raceway, it was no surprise to see Kasey Kahne’s team make a sudden change.

It could have cost him a victory. Instead, Kahne rallied to his second points race victory in the last three weeks with a dominant run Sunday in the Pocono 500.

It nearly went awry early in the race when Kahne headed to pit road for a four-tire stop. At the last minute, crew chief Kenny Francis called for just a two-tire stop, and the crew was caught flat-footed when Kahne drove away missing three lug nuts on one of his wheels.

Kahne had to return to pit road for a second stop, which dropped him to 38th.

“Kasey did a great job driving it back up through the field,” Francis said. “We had a really, really good car, to be able to do that. It was pretty impressive to watch, really, for me. There at the end, I finally was relieved that we got back up front and were leading the race.”

That’s what momentum can do to a team, and Kahne and his No. 9 crew have been riding a wave of it since winning the All-Star race a month ago. Including that $1 million win, Kahne has been to Victory Lane three times in the past four events.

He knows he’s got his fans to thank after they voted him into the All-Star race, giving him the push he needed to rally his way to ninth in the Sprint Cup Series standings.

“As a driver, I didn’t feel like my confidence was down. But until I actually won this year, the All-Star race, I realized that I was leaving a little bit out there and wasn’t communicating probably like I should have been,” Kahne said. “I definitely credit the fans for getting us into the All-Star race. That gave us the momentum.

“That gave the company the excitement and the momentum that they needed, and myself, and that’s when I personally feel like I started communicating better and I’ve done a much better job since.

Has he ever.

He followed the All-Star win with a victory the next week in the Coca-Cola 600, and although he bobbled last week with a 31st-place finish at Dover, he owned Pocono.

Kahne started from the pole, overcame the missing lug nuts and led a race-high 69 of the 200 laps in his Dodge.

“Never. I’ve never had a car that dominant before,” Kahne said. “This one stayed the same all day long. It was so good all day long.”

Brian Vickers was second for his best finish since joining Red Bull Racing at the start of last season, and Denny Hamlin was third to give Toyota two cars in the top three.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was fourth and appeared winded after racing over four hours on the hottest day so far of the NASCAR season. Temperatures hovered around 90 degrees all day, even after a brief rain shower halted action midway through the race.

Vickers declared himself exhausted and blamed some of the issues on rising heat in NASCAR’s new car.

“It’s brutal. We’re going to the infield care center after the races and that’s ridiculous,” Vickers said. “NASCAR needs to step in and ... cool these cars down to help us. It is extremely freaking hot out there.”

Jeff Burton was fifth and was followed by Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth and Kurt Busch. Carl Edwards and Mark Martin rounded out the top 10.

Bobby Labonte was 11th and AJ Allmendinger was 12th to give Red Bull its best all-around day since the two-car team joined NASCAR last season.

Kyle Busch became the first driver to compete in all three of NASCAR’s national series at three different race tracks on the same weekend, but fell far short of winning a triple crown and finished last Sunday in the Sprint Cup race.

Busch, who wrecked his primary car in Saturday’s practice session, started at the rear of the field when he had to switch to his backup Toyota and was running deep in traffic when he ran into Jamie McMurray as the battled for the same spot of race track. It sent Busch into the garage for repairs, and even though his crew rebuilt the car and got him back on the track, he wound up 43rd.

“I saw (McMurray) get high, get loose, and thought he faded back further than he did,” Busch said. “We broke the mirror trying to adjust it there before the race and couldn’t see anything out my right rear quarter panel. So I couldn’t clear myself. The spotter didn’t say anything, so I apologize to McMurray for wrecking their day.”

Busch was second in Friday night’s Truck Series race at Texas Motor Speedway, and was a distant 20th in the Nationwide Series race at Nashville on Saturday night.

But even worse, his cozy lead in the Sprint Cup Series standings was gobbled up as Busch lost 121 points of his lead. Burton now trails him by just 21 points.

“We just had a bad weekend in Pocono, that’s all we can really say,” crew chief Steve Addington said. “We’ve had a great year. You can’t sit here and dwell on one weekend.”