Nascar

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — NASCAR is an odd sport if you spend some time away from the garage, covering your basic ball-and-stick sports. Imagine baseball changing the distance from home to first base by a few feet a few days into the season. Or the NFL widening the goal posts right before Week 1 kicks off. NASCAR's burden is that it is a sport driven, no pun intended, by technology. And so the rules of engagement are an evolving process. It leads us to the unveiling of the 2011 season and, already, a conundrum for NASCAR.

Don't expect a great deal of change when it comes to NASCAR and its start times. Although there has been a push from its TV partners to look at shifting starting times, NASCAR is sticking to its mixed bag for the next season. Regular-season points races in the Eastern and Central regions of the country will start at 1 p.m.; West Coast events will begin at 3 p.m.; and night races will begin at 7:30 p.m. Once the 10-race Chase playoff format kicks in, six of the first seven races will start at 2 p.m. and the last three races, including the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway, will begin at 3 p.m. Fox Sports Chairman David Hill recently suggested moving starting times in the fall to avoid conflicts with the NFL. That switch would benefit ESPN much more than Fox because ESPN picks up the broadcasts in the second half of the season.

Big brothers always like to pick on little brothers. Just ask the Busch boys, participants in some brotherly hijinks during Kyle's marriage ceremony Dec. 31. Set in Chicago's Holy Name Cathedral, Kyle and fiancee Samantha Sarcinella were in a blissful moment as Kyle kneeled in front of the priest for the first time. That's when the chuckles started in the pews, filled with 300 or so family and friends. Older brother Kurt had written "HELP ME" on the bottom of one of Kyle's shoes.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Fox Sports Chairman David Hill isn't shy with words or opinions. He has offered both in bunches during the NASCAR media tour, sharing his perspective on what it will take to get NASCAR out of its doldrums. A few things come to mind: Ditch the homogenized Car of Tomorrow, make the focus on drivers and shorten race times. "The Car of Tomorrow became the biggest red herring in the history of this sport," Hill said. "It took the emphasis away from the heroes.

Handle with care George Diaz Orlando Sentinel Change ultimately will be a good thing for NASCAR, as long as it simplifies the criteria in the chase for points. You know your sport has a problem when some drivers aren't sure of where they stand until they look at the final race stats. It shouldn't be so complicated. Speculation swirls that NASCAR wants to use a scoring system that would award 43 points to the race winner and one point fewer for each ensuing position down to one point for the 43rd-place finisher.

Got a secret? Please don't tell anybody associated with NASCAR. Your secret will go viral shortly after it leaves your lips. Consider two significant changes on the horizon that haven't been announced "officially" but have been all over Twitter and the rest of cyberspace for the last few weeks as NASCAR prepares to kick off its 2011 season: •Expect a change in the points system to determine the Sprint Cup champion. •And all those "bushwackers" who love to double-dip on Saturdays and Sundays now must decide whether they want to compete for a Nationwide title or a Sprint Cup title because they can't do both.

NASCAR is about to get hipper and hotter. Travis Pastrana, the charismatic Moto X, X Games and American rally racing icon, is crossing over to NASCAR to compete as a driver and team owner. Pastrana will make his debut in the NASCAR Nationwide Series in 2011 under the Pastrana-Waltrip Racing banner. He will own and drive Toyota Camrys from Michael Waltrip Racing. "Competing in the sport is a lifelong dream," Pastrana said in a statement. "I decided to try to turn that dream into reality.

NASCAR Davidsonville's Pastrana headed to Nationwide series Travis Pastrana of Davidsonville has signed a deal with Michael Waltrip Racing that could put him in NASCAR's second-tier Nationwide series as early as next year. The action sports star has formed a team called Pastrana-Waltrip Racing, with Michael Waltrip and Gary and Blake Bechtel . Pending NASCAR approval, he will run seven Nationwide races next season and 20 in 2012. "I've been following NASCAR closely for years as a fan of the sport with competing in the sport a lifelong dream," Pastrana said in a statement released Thursday.

People sugarcoat all the warts and peccadilloes in honoring the dead. But there will be no revisionist history when his NASCAR friends and family gather Wednesday at Darlington Presbyterian Church for a celebration of Jim Hunter 's life. He was a great guy. Hunter died Friday in Daytona Beach, Fla., after a 12-month battle with cancer. He was 71. Hunter's most recent position was NASCAR vice president of corporate communications, but he was a kind of guy who was hard to box in with one title.

There is quite a bit of media interest in NASCAR lately. Unfortunately, it involves a lack of interest among race fans. Ratings for the first four races of the Chase for the Championship were down 27 percent compared with last year. The level of concern prompted a meeting between ESPN and NASCAR executives last weekend in Charlotte, N.C. "Some people are asking, 'Is it because you've switched from ABC to ESPN?'" said Andy Hall, spokesman for ESPN. "There isn't that much of a difference in the reach.