NASCAR announces new points system

NASCAR officials announced a new point system for the 2011 season along with changes to the way drivers qualify for the Chase for the Sprint Cup plus a number of rule adjustments.

NASCAR Chairman and CEO Brian France said on Wednesday that drivers in all NASCAR national series will be awarded points on a 43 to 1 scale with one-point decreases, giving a complete overhaul to the points allocation that had been in place for NASCAR since 1975.

France stated the change is based on having a more simple system that is easier to understand and apply, although it is also expected to to keep gaps tighter than in the past.

"Many of our most loyal fans don't fully understand the points system we have used to date," said France, referencing the system that has been in use since 1975. "So, we are simplifying the points system to one that is much easier to understand. Conceptually, it is comparable to our previous system, but it is easier to follow."

A new bonus points system was also announced to reward drivers winning races. A driver claiming victory will get three bonus points, one more will be given for leading a lap and another one for leading the most laps, which means a winner can claim a maximum of 48 points.

Adjustments have also been made to the way the Chase format is set for the final ten races. The top 10 in the points during the regular season will automatically become title contenders, while two additional spots will be given to those winning the most races who aren't already qualified.

If there are no race winners outside the top 10 after race 26, the final two slots in the Chase will be determined by the point standings.

Points for those in the Chase will now be reset to 2000 plus three bonus per win, although 11th and 12th places will not get the benefit of the bonus.

Under this format, last year's Daytona 500 and Brickyard 400 winner Earnhardt Ganassi's Jamie McMurray would have been in the Chase, while Richard Childress' Clint Bowyer would have missed it.

"The fans tell us that winning matters the most with them, so we're combining the tradition of consistency in our sport with the excitement that comes along with winning," said France.

"This makes every race count leading into the 26th race of the season at Richmond, when we set the field for the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup."

Minor tweaks were also revealed for qualifying, the order not being determined by a draw anymore, instead by speeds from practice. If qualifying gets rained out, practice speeds will also be used to set the field, while If no practice or qualifying are run, then the owner standings determine the starting grid.

France also confirmed that NASCAR drivers competing in more than one national series can only contend for one championship, putting Cup regulars out of the title equation in the Nationwide and Truck series.

Officials also announced that tyre allocation for practice and qualifying will be decreased from six to five sets of tyres. Four of those sets will be returned to Goodyear in order to receive their tyres for the race.

Self-ventilated dumps cans will also be implemented for the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series, after successfully being tested in the trucks last year. This will eliminate the need for a catch-can man, decreasing the number of "over-the-wall" crew members from seven to six.

Hammers lead Barrera chaseNASCAR confirms points change talks

Hamlin tops day two at Daytona

Denny Hamlin was fastest in Friday's rain-affected NASCAR practice session at Daytona, where most teams continued to focus on single-car testing, avoiding running in the draft.

The Joe Gibbs Racing driver, runner-up in the 2010 Sprint Cup series, was one of only 12 drivers who attempted running in the draft, although most of his slipstream mileage came in a two-car breakaway with his team-mates Kyle Busch and Joey Logano.

Hamlin set a fastest lap of 45.716 seconds at an average speed of 196.868 mph, which improved on Thursday's top speeds set by the Michael Waltrip Racing duo of David Reutimann and Martin Truex Jr.

Tony Stewart was second-fastest, also lapping in the 196mph range, and was followed on the timesheets by the Toyota of Logano, the Penske Dodge of Brad Keselowski and the Red Bull Camry of Brian Vickers, the latter completing the most laps of any driver during the day.

Once again the Earnhardt Childress Racing-powered Chevrolets showed great speed, with Richard Childress' Clint Bowyer and the Earnhardt Ganassi duo of Jamie McMurray and Juan Pablo Montoya being fastest among those focusing on single-car runs only.

Practice was delayed due to overnight and morning rain and it was after 1pm track before conditions allowed drivers to go on the track. The session was initially scheduled to run until 5pm but officials extended running to 6pm.

Although testing is scheduled until Saturday afternoon, many teams have already packed up to return to North Carolina, having completed their programme during the first two days.

Reigning champion Jimmie Johnson, who was sixth-fastest of those running in the draft on Friday, will not be testing on the final day, and nor will his team-mate Dale Earnhardt Jr, who has family commitments on Saturday.

Following Saturday's sessions, teams will return to Daytona during the second week of February for the Budweiser Shootout and the Daytona 500.

Keselowski fastest on final test dayZaragoza want Pennant stay

Stewart laments incident in Australia

Tony Stewart has expressed his regret at getting into an off-track incident in Australia last week, while competing in a sprint car event at Sydney Speedway.

The two-time NASCAR Sprint Cup champion was reportedly questioned by local police last Saturday after having a physical altercation with track co-owner Bret Morris following a dispute over safety conditions at the track, which was affected by heavy rain.

Stewart, who returned to the US last weekend, confirmed on Thursday at Daytona that he was involved in the confrontation and then questioned by the police over the incident.

"There was an altercation at the racetrack," said Stewart. "It was a dispute between myself and one of the owners of the facility. But as it also reported, we went down to the police station, we gave them a statement. They told us after the statement that we were free to go back to the hotel room and free to get on the plane the next day. But definitely wasn't the way I wanted to end my trip.

"We had a fun trip over there. Obviously there was a lot of flooding and raining while we were there, but at the same time we still had a good race trip over there and didn't end that last night the way we wanted to by any means. But it's not uncommon to see drivers and track owners have disputes over what's going on, but this one went a little bit further than a normal dispute."

Although the issue has reportedly not yet been closed by police in New South Wales, Stewart shrugged off any concerns about it possibly going any further.

"I'm not concerned about it," Stewart said. "If there is and we have to go back, we'll deal with it. But it's nothing that we're concerned with at this point. Like I said, when they were done with us, they said we were able to go back to the hotel and were able get on our flight and come back.

"I made sure that they knew exactly where we were staying, when our flight was, what the flight number was and how to get hold of us the whole time. We'll deal with it if anything else comes about."

Stewart, also a team and track owner in the US, has previously been involved in other off-track altercations, shoving a journalist at a NASCAR Sprint Cup event at Indianapolis in 2002 and more recently pushing a USAC official at an event where his team was competing in 2008.

"Well, I'm definitely not proud of what happened, and if I had to do it all over again, I would have dealt with it much different," said an apologetic Stewart about last week's incident.

"Like I said, this isn't something that I've blown off. I've lost a lot of sleep over it because I'm very embarrassed that I made it through a whole trip and the night before I come home I get in an altercation with somebody, and that really hasn't happened for a while.

"I'm not at all the least bit proud of it. I'm ashamed about it, but at the same time it's been nice to get back with the team and it's nice to come down here and worry about driving the racecar again.

"And it's not that it's making me forget about it, but it's at least getting my mind off it enough to relax."

Stewart laments incident in AustraliaForlan refuses to rule out move

NASCAR confirms points change talks

NASCAR president Mike Helton has confirmed that changes to a new simpler points system could be announced over the coming days.

Helton said that a possible new points system is currently being discussed by officials, as NASCAR looks set to change the current one which has been in place since 1975. No updates on possible changes to the play-off format were discussed by Helton, though.

"Where we're at today is we're in the middle of the conversations, asking or actually telling our competitors where our mind is," Helton said.

"The goal has been for several years to have a more simple points system. If you look at all motorsports and even other sports as well, at times it's complicated, and even for us, we have occasionally to go to the rulebook and look at what position got what points.

"The goal for some time has been to create a points system that is easy to understand, easy to explain, easy to be talked about but also be credible at the end of the season.

"So it's a function of taking the current one that establishes the criteria for credibility, because of the length and the time we've used it more than anything, and come up with one that you can sit down and have a conversation with someone and say 'what do you think about this' and them say 'well that's pretty simple.'"

Helton said NASCAR is pondering different ways of rewarding race winners more through bonus points. The changes in the points system being studied would apply to all NASCAR national series if put into effect.

"Our goal was to make it simple, so we start there," said Helton. "I think we have a model or actually several that accomplish that. But we get to the one that makes it simple. We can continue enhancing the attention and the appetite to win by bonus points and how we apply those to a basic simple structure to start with.

"We can also do things with the events themselves, the field that goes into the Chase, the Chase events to continue to encourage and put appetite on winning races, but the points models start off with a simple system. We can accomplish the attention to winning with bonus points and other pieces."

Helton also confirmed drivers competing in the Nationwide and Sprint Cup series may only contend for one championship, which prevents most Cup regulars from winning the title in the second-tier series. For the past five years, drivers from NASCAR's top series have won the Nationwide title.

NASCAR's vice president of competition Robin Pemberton said the possible implementation of fuel injection is progressing well, but there are no plans to race with the system in 2011.

Hammers lead Barrera chaseKeselowski wins Nationwide title

Elliott to drive for Phoenix in 2011

Former NASCAR champion and two-time Daytona 500 winner Bill Elliott will contest at least 18 Sprint Cup races with the Phoenix Racing team this year.

The 1988 title-winner has only raced part-time since 2004, contesting around a dozen Cup rounds per season in recent years, but will ramp up his schedule in 2011 as he drives for a Chevrolet team for the first time in his 35-year career.

"This may well be my last really good chance as a driver," Elliott said. "I'm going to give it my best shot. I feel like I'm still in good shape, and I thought we ran pretty good last year."

Team boss James Finch is confident that 55-year-old Elliott can be a frontrunner this season.

"It's big for us and big for Chevrolet to get Bill Elliott," Finch said. "With the right equipment, he's ready. He was just a couple of hundredths of a second off the pole at Homestead last year."

Phoenix won its first race with Brad Keselowski at Talladega in 2009 but had a difficult 2010 campaign with a number of drivers. Elliott expects Phoenix's 2011 package - which includes Hendrick-prepared engines - to be very competitive.

"I think this will be a really good deal," said Elliott. "James has really good racecars, and there's no doubt about the Hendrick equipment. After all, look at all the championships they've won."

Di Maria clinches Real dealHendrick reshuffles crew chiefs

Waltrip Toyotas top drafting session

The Michael Waltrip Racing Toyotas of David Reutimann and Martin Truex Jr topped an uneventful Thursday drafting practice session as NASCAR Sprint Cup teams continued to gear up for the Daytona 500.

Reutimann, a two-time winner in the series, set a fastest lap of 45.970 seconds, at an average speed of 195.780 mph, achieved while running in tandem with his MWR team-mate Truex, who was second on the timesheets.

Behind them, Red Bull's returnee Brian Vickers was third-fastest, also achieving his best lap while working in tandem with his team-mate Kasey Kahne.

Stewart Haas' Tony Stewart was fifth, setting his best lap while drafting in single file with both MWR and Red Bull cars in a five-car group, the biggest seen during the four-hour session. However, his best lap was over a second slower than what the top four managed after splitting into two-car team formations.

Despite much anticipation to the afternoon session, few drivers ventured on the track to draft and figure out the effect of the new, smoother Daytona asphalt, which proved to allow more bump-drafting than in the past.

"It looked like a lot of guys were just working on a lot of stuff today so maybe they're going to be focused on drafting tomorrow," said Vickers. "I'm sure before we leave you'll see a pretty big pack. I can't imagine you wouldn't because I know pretty much everybody wants to see how the cars react in that situation, the track and all that stuff."

Many drivers and teams continued to focus on single-car runs, hoping to get most of their programmes done before switching to drafting mode. Some rain is forecast for the Daytona area on Friday.

Teams will continue to test until Saturday for the Daytona 500, which takes place on February 20.

Bowyer leads first Daytona testNadal set for Mallorca role

Keselowski fastest on final test day

Brad Keselowski topped the final day of testing at Daytona on Saturday as teams continued to find more speed in preparation for next month's 500-mile NASCAR season-opener at the track.

The Penske driver, using a two-car draft, was able to break into the 198mph bracket reaching an average speed of 198.605 mph, with a lap time of 45.3126 seconds, the fastest seen during the three days of running. His Penske team-mate Kurt Busch was second, lapping in the same tenth and also reaching a similar speed while working in tandem with the Nationwide Series champion.

"It's a completely new breed of racing," said Keselowski about drafting on the new Daytona surface, which offers more grip.

"It will take an intelligent duo to pull it off. From a driver's side, it's similar to a baton relay. If you have the two fastest runners in the world and you put them in a baton relay and they can't exchange, an average Joe that can exchange will beat them.

"As the weekend has progressed, it has become more and more obvious, the thought of there being a big pack - I think we might see an extinction of that here."

The Joe Gibbs Racing duo of Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin had been fastest in the morning, lapping over 197mph, while Richard Petty's AJ Allmendinger became the first Ford driver to test in the draft, working with rookie Steven Wallace to set the fifth and sixth fastest laps of the morning session.

Despite drafting speeds reaching almost 200mph, NASCAR officials did not anticipate any changes being made to the current restrictor plate, which uses holes of 29/32nds of an inch.

Drivers making single-car runs, which continued to be a clear majority, lapped in the 185mph bracket, topped by Roush Fenway's Greg Biffle on Saturday afternoon and followed by the Earnhardt Ganassi duo of Jamie McMurray and Juan Pablo Montoya.

Sprint Cup director John Darby underlined that many teams focused on testing the two-car breakaway, which some still doubt will yield as much dividend as it has shown in the past at Talladega come race day.

"Obviously the guys are working on the tandem deal knowing that's faster than the draft," Darby said. "Everybody's working on a little different agenda, and it's all trying to find that edge to win the Daytona 500.

"I think this test has done more in building confidence. There's always some anxiety around what happens when a track repaves."

Teams will return to Daytona in the second week of February for the Budweiser Shootout, followed by the Daytona 500 a week later.

Bowyer leads first Daytona testHammers lead Barrera chase