Busch, Stewart pick up from last season at practice

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Tony Stewart and Kurt Busch, who each spent more than half of last season on NASCAR probation, kicked the new season off in the same potential vein Friday night at Daytona International Speedway.

"This is the NASCAR everybody fell in love with," NASCAR vice president for corporate communications Jim Hunter said to a gang of more than two-dozen media members behind the NASCAR office trailer. "Emotions run high. As far as penalties, we'll wait and see."

Hunter's comment was only half in jest, based on a recent comment by NASCAR chairman Brian France that the sanctioning body was going to try to return to its roots this season -- or at least not promote any more drastic changes.

Hunter said the boundaries for showing their emotions were still being drawn -- though actions such as Busch's in recent years have drawn fairly stiff penalties.

"It's going to be difficult, as a matter of fact -- and we said that," Hunter said. "Professional race drivers need to control their emotions when they're in the racecar; and I think we've shown in the past that we'll do whatever we need to do to make sure they do.

"There's a lot of emotion in driving a racecar, and I think this was an example of that. Both drivers were emotional. After tomorrow's meeting, we'll see where we are."

Crack of dawn meetings aren't Stewart's favorite, but for the second time in 10 months the former two-time Cup champion has been summoned to one with NASCAR's top officials -- along with Busch -- after the two drivers were involved in some on-track fender banging on the season's opening day, in the second practice for Saturday night's Budweiser Shootout.

A short time after the track re-opened following an eight-car accident in the practice's opening moments, Stewart's No. 20 Gibbs Racing Toyota and Busch's No. 2 Penske Racing Dodge made contact at the end of the backstretch. Busch then hit the outside wall, which brought out a caution flag as Stewart's car slid to the track's apron.

As the cars returned to pit road, Busch caught up to Stewart and drove his car into the right side of Stewart's machine three times. The two men then maneuvered their cars to impede each other's access to the exit lane off pit road, before they drove to their garage stalls (watch video).

Stewart and Busch were immediately summoned to a meeting with NASCAR vice president for competition Robin Pemberton and Sprint Cup Series director John Darby, Hunter said.

Hunter, who said NASCAR had reviewed videotape of the incident, declined to give many details of the meeting, saying "what was said in there; stays in there," but said the mood was "civil."

"I think this was a typical reaction for an accident on a racetrack when neither driver felt they were at fault," Hunter said. "Any time there's an accident, there's differences of opinion on why the accident happened. In the discussion that followed in the truck, each driver had an opportunity to present his view and did. We listened and John Darby said he'd like to see them both tomorrow."

Hunter said the fact there were no crews working on pit road during the practice mitigated the circumstances to a small degree. He added that the drivers' past histories wouldn't enter into NASCAR's decision on this incident.

Ryan Newman' spin led to an eight-car crash.

"They start this with a new slate," Hunter said. "It's a new season -- the first race -- so we'll see what happens tomorrow in their conversation with Mr. Darby."

Hunter said Darby demanded another meeting with the two drivers in the morning and, when asked what time it would occur, said "5 a.m." The Sprint Cup garage is scheduled to open at 8 a.m. ET Saturday.

Following the Friday night session, both Stewart and Busch left the meeting via the office trailer's side door, and declined comment to a group of media waiting at the garage's back entrance.

Busch's crew chief, Pat Tryson, was in the hauler, as was Ryan Newman, who was involved in the first accident -- but neither was in the meeting with Stewart and Busch, Hunter said. While Hunter said "neither driver would accept blame for the incidents," Tryson was blunter.

"We were out there drafting and both our car and Tony's car was pretty good," Tryson said. "They were on the backstretch and Tony had a little run on us. He went to the inside, but there was a slower car there so he came back to the outside and there was just barely enough room -- he got into our right rear and turned left and pretty much just wrecked us.

"Anybody can play it any way they want, but it was Tony's fault. There's some frustration from past history, but that is what it is and we'll work on our car and try to get a third one down here tomorrow morning. We'll get ready for the Bud Shootout and put this behind us and get ready for the Daytona 500."

Busch was on probation until the end of 2007 after he drove his car within inches of Stewart's car on Dover's pit road, forcing a Stewart crewman to jump over Stewart's car's nose to escape; after the two men got in a similar tussle on the racetrack last June.

Stewart was placed on probation in April of 2007 for the balance of the year after he skipped his post-race media obligation at Phoenix International Raceway. He was called to a 6 a.m. meeting with NASCAR officials at Talladega Superspeedway the following weekend after he made comments likening NASCAR racing to professional wrestling.

The big accident of the day happened on the sixth lap of practice, also at the end of the backstretch, when the No. 07 Chevrolet of Clint Bowyer and Newman's No. 12 Penske Racing Dodge made contact. Newman's car spun up the racetrack and collected the cars of Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Bill Elliott and David Gilliland (watch video).

Stewart's crew was working on his car as the evening ended. Teams that had to go to back-up cars -- either pulling them out of trailers already in the infield, as Hendrick Motorsports' No. 48 and 24 teams did for Johnson and Gordon, respectively -- or bringing them down from North Carolina, as Newman and Busch planned to do.

Bowyer's car was repaired and made more laps by the end of practice.

The teams of Carl Edwards and Mark Martin, who collided and spun after clearing the initial wreck, were repairing their cars, as was Gilliland's crew. Elliott's Wood Brothers Racing team had a back-up on a small trailer in the infield.