As I don’t watch a huge amount, I don’t know a huge amount about NASCAR. However, one thing I have noticed is that in recent years whenever something controversial or dangerous happens, it seems to involve one man.

Kyle Busch.

Here is his latest effort:

As a result, Busch was parked immediately in this race, and for the Nationwide and Sprint Cup races this weekend.

It actually reminds me of a similar incident that occurred in V8 Supercars in 2002 between Paul Romano and Rodney Forbes.

Forbes had punted Romano heading into Honda Corner at Phillip Island in what appeared to be a fairly standard braking incident. Romano however, took it into his own hands to “pay back” Forbes for the incident.

Romano’s penalty was 150 point championship points – certainly the largest I can remember before or since. It also left him with the dubious honour of being the only driver in championship history to finish on negative points.

He made only a small handful of appearances in the series ever again.

Kyle Busch might not be blown out of the NASCAR series just yet, but hot-headed revenge acts have no place in a sport like motor racing.

Given the recent deaths of Dan Wheldon and Marco Simoncelli, safety should be first and foremost in everyone’s mind.

And this was just dumb and dangerous – no matter however Busch wants to spin it.

Midst the 2010 broadcast of the Bathurst 1000, Seven did controversially “time slip” the coverage to show more of the race. While they did achieve that, it was the wrong thing to do, and some broadcasting rules were changed to stop them from doing it again.

Indeed, the 2011 race remained completely live throughout.

Many of the complainers say that Network Ten – (who held the rights between 1997 and 2006) – should get them back again, because they “never did anything like that”.

Oh really? So what did they do here in their 1997 broadcast of the then Primus Bathurst 1000 Classic?

Well, clearly before the commercial break shown in this footage, the Tomas Mezera car was already deeply bunkered in the sand trap at the bottom of The Chase. As the network threw to the break, they were on lap 27 of the race.

Cue three and a half minute commercial break. Back from the break, we have a minute and a half of race update. So it is at least five minutes since the incident, and still they haven’t shown it, and we are up to lap 30.

So how long had the car actually been in the sand trap?

After 14 years, it is difficult to say precisely, but according to the official lap chart of the race from the Dorian timing system, the last lap the 47 car completed was lap 25.

So it actually happened on lap 26 – four laps before they actually showed it.

The sole leader throughout this period was Peter Brock, with laps of 2:14.1457, 2:13.9709, 2:13.5204, 2:14.2344, and 2:13.6238 between laps 26 and 30 – a total of 11 minutes and 7 seconds – give or take one lap depending on exactly where on the lap Mezera was in comparison to Brock when the accident occurred.

Eleven minutes?

One of the most iconic and most often replayed incidents in the fifty year history of the race – and they missed it by eleven minutes? And pretended that it was live?

Don’t be so sure about just how good a job Channel Ten used to do!

A number of drivers were clearly jumping kerbs and not being penalised, while others who didn’t seem to be jumping them were being penalised.

Most notable was the Holden Racing Team car number one, which was ordered in for a penalty under huge protest from the team, who were insistent that driver Darren Turner was not jumping the kerbs.

So what did THAT email say? (Click for larger view).