  Given a family G of rectangles, to which one associates a tree [G], one
defines a natural number $\lambda$ [G] called its analytic split and
satisfying, for all 1 < p < $\infty$ log($\lambda$ [G]) p MG p p where MG is
the Hardy-Littlewood type maximal operator associated to the family G. As an
application, we completely characterize the boundeness of planar rarefied
directional maximal operators on L p for 1 < p < $\infty$. Precisely, if
$\Omega$ is an arbitrary set of angles in [0, $\pi$ 4), we prove that any
rarefied basis B of the directional basis R $\Omega$ yields an operator MB that
has the same L p-behavior than the directional maximal operator M $\Omega$ for
1 < p < $\infty$.
