Joe Nemechek (01) spun on Lap 391, which helped Jimmie Johnson (48) position himself for a run at the checkered flag. Credit: CIA Stock Photo

Coke 600 wreckfest left few drivers unscathed

CONCORD, N.C. -- All that was missing from Sunday night's Coca-Cola 600 was a full moon.

A record 22 caution flags slowed the longest race in NASCAR, making it even longer than usual, and the cautions plus a red flag with nine laps remaining ate up 103 of the 400 laps.

	Kurt Busch crashed twice and ultimately finished 43rd. Credit: Autostock
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The 22 cautions broke the mark of 20, set three times at Bristol Motor Speedway, most recently in 2003. By the time the field pulled off the speedway for the final time, it looked more like a race at Bristol than at Lowe's.

Most of the leaders were involved in at least one crash, and others were involved in every third one, or so it seemed. The number of cars with a chance to win the race that were eliminated in the chaos was staggering.

• With eight laps remaining, Joe Nemechek had the lead and the race in the palm of his hand until he drove into Turn 3 and ran over some debris, popping his right rear tire. He hit the wall, but saved the car, and drove down pit road. He finished 18th.

• Jeff Gordon, who led six times for 49 laps, got caught once by the track and again on Lap 380 when Hendrick teammate Brian Vickers turned Bill Elliott on the way into Turn 1. Gordon nearly missed it, but Elliott slid down in front of him and he center-punched Elliott's left-front fender.

Gordon retired two laps later, and Vickers, who led a race-best 98 laps, was damaged too badly to continue.

• Kurt Busch, the defending series champion, wrecked just nine laps in, and after stomping to his transporter -- through a local news cameraman -- he returned to the track only to crash again, on Lap 163. That did it for Busch.

• Michael Waltrip caught a piece of a Lap 102 dustup involving four other cars, and was eliminated when his teammate, Dale Earnhardt Jr., jacked him up on the front stretch on Lap 247. That crash eliminated Matt Kenseth and Terry Labonte as well.

Labonte was transported to Carolinas Medical Center with a foot injury after that one. He was treated and released.

Ryan Newman, the record-setting pole-sitter, had the front end of his Alltel Dodge altered in a crash, but rebounded to finish fifth.

"It's kind of amazing to get a top-five finish out of something that could have been nothing," Newman said. "I got in the back of Terry Labonte in that big crash. There was really nothing I could do. I checked up, and got in the back of him and holed it out."

• Tony Stewart, who finally had fixed an inconsistent Home Depot Chevrolet, tagged another car on a restart and finished 24th.

To make a long story short, the record number of cautions turned the Coca-Cola 600 into a last-man-standing type of race.

Time of the race was 5 hours, 13 minutes, 52 seconds -- the third-longest 600 on record. On the flip side, 21 drivers led the race, which was a record for Lowe's Motor Speedway, and there were 37 lead changes.

Of those 21 drivers who led the race, however, all but five were either involved or eliminated by crashes, engine failures or tire failures.