Bruton Smith

One of the most influential men in motor sports has his eye on the National Hot Rod Assn., the Glendora-based sanctioning body that oversees most drag racing in the United States. Bruton Smith, whose Speedway Motorsports Inc., rivals the France family's International Speedway Corp. in racetrack ownership, told The Times on Friday he wanted to buy the NHRA's assets. SMI owns three NHRA drag strips, at Las Vegas, Sonoma and Bristol, Tenn.

One of the most influential men in motor sports has his eye on the National Hot Rod Assn., the Glendora-based sanctioning body that oversees most drag racing in the United States. Bruton Smith, whose Speedway Motorsports Inc., rivals the France family's International Speedway Corp. in racetrack ownership, told The Times on Friday he wanted to buy the NHRA's assets. SMI owns three NHRA drag strips, at Las Vegas, Sonoma and Bristol, Tenn.

Motor racing: A brief in Friday's Sports section about a threat to shut down Lowe's Motor Speedway in Concord, N.C., misspelled the first name of its owner, Bruton Smith, as Burton.

The late Les Richter, an ex-Los Angeles Ram who twice helped establish big-league auto racing in Southern California, again was nominated for NASCAR's Hall of Fame. Richter, who died in 2010 at age 79, was among 25 nominees announced Wednesday for enshrinement in the 2014 class. Five will be selected later this year. Other nominees include team owners Rick Hendrick and Richard Childress, three-time Daytona 500 winner Dale Jarrett, track operator O. Bruton Smith and the late Wendell Scott, the only African American to win a race in what is now NASCAR's premier Sprint Cup Series.

Richard Petty's last race has been such a hot ticket item that Atlanta Motor Speedway says it is adding a 12,000-seat grandstand outside the second turn for the Nov. 15 NASCAR Hooters 500. "We felt compelled to build this grandstand in time for Richard Petty's final race," speedway president Bruton Smith said Wednesday.

INDIANAPOLIS -- NASCAR's popularity seems stuck in neutral, never a flattering description even outside this sport. Although NASCAR remains among the nation's most popular sports, attendance at many of the 19 Sprint Cup Series races this season was either flat or dipped from a year earlier. So did NASCAR's average television ratings. Now -- as the series moves further into the 36-race season's second half with Sunday's Brickyard 400 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway -- the question is whether NASCAR's appeal will pick up as it gets closer to its "Chase for the Cup" title playoff this fall.

England fired Coach Steve McClaren on Thursday, a day after failing to qualify for the 2008 European Championship by losing at home to Croatia. Football Assn. Chairman Geoff Thompson said McClaren's contract had been terminated along with that of assistant Terry Venables. Needing only a draw at Wembley Stadium to qualify for Euro 2008, England was beaten, 3-2, by Croatia on Wednesday night. Croatia had already qualified, and the other spot from Group E went to Russia.

The rich may indeed be like the rest of us. Prices of their homes are now falling too. Gated mansions and hillside estates have held their own through most of the real estate slump, but data released Monday showed big drops in the region's most exclusive neighborhoods. Median sale prices fell by 13% in Beverly Hills in April, compared with the same month last year.

The National Hot Rod Assn. agreed Wednesday to sell its professional drag-racing series and certain other assets for $109.5 million to a group led by the pioneer developer of the DirecTV satellite-television company. The NHRA, based in Glendora, will remain the sport's nonprofit sanctioning body and focus on its amateur drag-racing activities. But its high-profile professional league, the Powerade Drag Racing Series, will be acquired by HD Partners Acquisition Corp.

CONCORD, N.C. -- With his aggressive driving style and cocky manner, Kyle Busch is used to being booed on the NASCAR Sprint Cup circuit. But perhaps "Rowdy Busch," as he's called, is starting to earn grudging respect from more of the NASCAR Nation -- especially given his stellar season so far. When the 23-year-old Las Vegas native Thursday put his Toyota Camry on the pole for Sunday's Coca-Cola 600, a cheer erupted from the grandstands at Lowe's Motor Speedway here. Busch turned a lap of 185.

Kasey Kahne wasn't ready to relinquish the track record at Las Vegas Motor Speedway simply because they changed the track. Kahne won the pole position Friday for Sunday's Nextel Cup race as he and most of the field obliterated his previous track record, as expected, thanks to the revamped Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The track was repaved in the off-season and its corner banking was raised to 20 degrees from 12, lifting speeds for this year's UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400. Kahne set a lap record of 184.