SIDETRACK
END OF THE ROAD: Matt LeBlanc has just revealed the real reason for him parting ways with “Top Gear.” The Newton native, who’s racing down the homestretch as the popular BBC program’s host during its current season, recently shared that he simply had too much on his plate, especially for an actor of a certain age. “I was jet-lagged for three years!” he told the Daily Mail, adding, “I’m 51 and I’m tired. Between ‘Top Gear’ and the sitcom I’m doing in LA, ‘Man With A Plan,’ I was working too hard … I realized you need balance between work and play, and mine was out of whack.” LeBlanc came to his decision while taking a breather back in California, after he wrapped filming the show’s latest slew of episodes. The break apparently helped him realize he wanted more free time to spend with the important things in life, including his 15-year-old daughter, Marina, whom he shares with ex-wife Melissa McKnight. “I’d had time to think and to spend with my daughter and I realized how much I missed her — and my friends and my mother and sleeping in my own bed,” he said. Through March, new episodes of “Top Gear” will let fans catch a final glimpse at LeBlanc behind the wheel as he tests cars out in places like Norway and Sri Lanka. But come next season, we’ll all have to brace ourselves because former cricketer Freddie Flintoff and Paddy McGuinness are slated to jump in the driver’s seat in his stead. A FAREWELL TO LEE: Former “Real Housewives of New York City” cast member and author Carole Radziwill just paid public tribute to Lee Radziwill, mourning her mother-in-law who died last week at the age of 85. The reality star and award-winning journalist posted an appropriately elegant black-and-white photograph of the late socialite, who was the younger sister of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and sister-inlaw of President John F. Kennedy. Alongside the picture, the ex-Bravo personality wrote, “She was loved. Rest in Peace, Lee. Thank you for the kind words & comments.” Carole had been married to Lee’s son, ABC News Producer Anthony Radziwill, who passed away from cancer in 1999 — just weeks after his cousin and close friend, John F. Kennedy Jr., died in a plane crash.