What if they threw an afternoon full of caution flags and a race broke out?

While it might be a bit of an exaggeration, that's almost the way today's race at Martinsville played out.

There was a record number of cautions, 21 in all, including an awkward and anticlimactic green-white-checkered finish that gave Jimmie Johnson the victory, his seventh of the NASCAR season.

The day belonged to Hendrick Motorsports, with Jeff Gordon dominating the first half of the race, leading the most laps from the pole, and hanging on to the points lead with his 3rd-place finish. Teammate Johnson had the better car at the end however, winning the race and delivering the three-peat for the 48 team at Martinsville, while narrowing the gap between him and Gordon in the standings. Another Hendrick teammate, Kyle Busch, joined Gordon and Johnson in the top 5, finishing 4th.

The only car that looked like it might have anything for Johnson at the end was the No. 12 of Ryan Newman, who got up to the 48's rear bumper during the green-white-checkers before the final caution came out. Newman finished 2nd unofficially, while Roush-Fenway's Matt Kenseth rounded out the top 5. Unlike the latter part of today's Subway 500, the race actually went green for the first 44 laps until Robby Gordon cut a tire and hit the wall to bring out the first of many cautions. Jeff Gordon had the dominant car in the early going and the first lead change didn't occur until lap 109, when Jimmie Johnson passed Gordon to take over first. Gordon was the overall lap leader, however, leading twice for a total of 168 laps.

Richard Childress driver Jeff Burton inherited the lead through pit strategy at lap 119. He and Dale Earnhardt Jr. each led a number of laps in the mid-part of the race, with Junior moving to the front on lap 226 after putting a fender to the rear bumper of Juan Pablo Montoya and moving him up the racetrack.

There were 10 cautions in the last 100 or so laps of the race, making for slow going and numerous short runs. "How long was that race? 12 hours?!" asked Dale Earnhartdt, Jr., when the race finally ended. Drivers like Johnson, Newman, and Kyle Busch, who did well on short runs, benefited, while Gordon, who seemed to be better on long runs, maintained but did not gain positions.

One of the most disturbing events of the day took place after the final green-white-checkers restart, when David Ragan spun exiting turn 1, his car coming to a rest on the track with the driver's door in the direct path of the hard charging race leaders. NASCAR failed to throw a caution until the oncoming cars were just feet from the stationary 6 car. It was very fortunate that disaster was averted, because it could have just as easily gone the other way.

Rounding out the top-10 finishers were Denny Hamlin (6), Greg Biffle (7), Juan Pablo Montoya (8), Clint Bowyer (9), and Kevin Harvick (10). There were six Chevys in the top 10, along with two Dodges and two Fords. Montoya was the highest finishing rookie, and it was his best finish since running 2nd at the Brickyard back in July. Meanwhile, David Reutimann in 17th had the best finish for Toyota. Greg Biffle's 7th-place finish gives that team three top-10s in the last five races. Hamlin's JGR teammate Tony Stewart was never really a factor today, having several minor altercations on the track and finishing 13th. Stewart is now 249 points out of 1st.

With seven of the top 10 (and 10 of the top 13) drivers being Chase contenders, there was not much of a shakeup in the point standings overall. In fact, the top six drivers in the Chase held serve, though Johnson moved closer to Gordon by 15 points, now 53 points behind his teammate. Johnson and Bowyer remain the only two drivers within a one-race points margin of Gordon, though Bowyer, despite a top-10 finish, actually fell 37 points further behind first. Kurt Busch was the lowest finishing Chase contender at 31st after hitting the wall on lap 166. He fell three spots in the standings to 10th.

There was also an odd altercation after the race between teammates Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards, who argued over something that occurred during the race, though it was unclear Sunday evening exactly what the problem was between them. Part of the argument was caught by a Speed TV cameraman and showed Edwards approaching Kenseth, giving him a series of pushes, exchanging words, and then feigning a punch at Kenseth's face. Jeff Gordon was fined $10,000 for a similar pit road incident with Kenseth after a 2006 Bristol race, though no points penalty was assessed. It was will be interesting to see whether Edwards receives similar treatment.

With passing at a premium today, there was plenty of bumping and banging all race long, much of it dished out by Dale Earnhardt, Jr., who finished 23rd with a bad engine. After the race, Junior boasted, "I've had fun p*ssin' everybody off."

Next week the series heads to Atlanta, one of the fastest tracks on the circuit where drivers tend to really let loose and do some racing. Tony Stewart won here last fall, with today's winner Jimmie Johnson taking Atlanta in the spring.