On the rise--again: Jason Leffler, Johnny Sauter and Casey Atwood are beginning the journey back to the promised land of Nextel Cup.(NASCAR)(National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing )

NASCAR loves its Cinderella stories. Bright kid gets big opportunity, dances his way to stardom and lives happily ever after in a quaint mansion on victory lane. What everyone forgets is that sometimes after the Big Dance, there's a giant hiccup at midnight. Before there can be a happy ending, the shoe has to fit.

For three young, obviously talented drivers--Jason Leffler, Johnny Sauter and Casey Atwood--the Nextel Cup fit hasn't happened yet. So these guys go about their chores back in NASCAR's Busch Series, waiting for another call-up to the big leagues.

Once upon a time, they all arrived in a rush. Leffler, 28, was the 1998 USAC Silver Crown champion before being gobbled up by Joe Gibbs. Sauter, 26, won 10 races and the ASA championship as a rookie in 2001 before Richard Childress signed him. Atwood, 23, took his first Busch pole at 17, won his first race at 18 years, 10 months (youngest in series history) and was heralded as the next Jeff Gordon when Ray Evernham signed him to his new Dodge team.

Leffler jumped from Gibbs' Busch car to a turbulent Cup season with Chip Ganassi in 2001 and to a successful run (one win, 10 poles) in one of Jim Smith's NASCAR trucks in 2002 and 2003--then struggled for Gene Haas in the last 10 Cup races of 2003. Sauter spent two tumultuous seasons in three different Busch cars. He won two races and was part of an owner's championship in 2003, then found himself jumping between Brewco Motorsports' No. 27 Busch Chew and Childress' star-crossed No. 30 Cup car in 2004--until he got a semi-pink slip from RCR in June that essentially put Sauter "on retainer" for RCR. Atwood lasted two seasons in Cup, one with Evernham and one under a partnership agreement with Evernham and Smith. By the end of Atwood's second season, the partnership and Atwood were gone.

Leffler, now in Haas' No. 00 Busch Series Chevy, sees light at the end of his tunnel.

"The reason I took this leap was that Gene's plan was to move this team to Cup when it's ready," says Leffler, who got his first Busch Series win in a rain-shortened June race at Nashville this season. "This team feels right."

Haas paired Leffler with Robert Barker, former crew chief of the No. 77 Cup car. "Jason can ...