You must be reading it wrong, those are Car numbers not positions. Across is no of laps, down is position on the track. For instance, Car 2, The Chickadee Commodore, led until lap 37 where Alan Grice pitted, putting car 05 in the lead for 2 laps, then Brock pitted, putting Gary Scott in car 15 into the lead for two laps before Gricey regained the lead.
On the completion of the first lap car 44 was in position 9, where it continually climbed the leader board swapping places with Johnson in car 17 for several laps