Harvick had just won the AdvoCare 500to remain third in points, maintaining a slim shot at the Sprint Cup championship going into next week’s season finale.

Two weeks earlier, the two were embroiled in a bitter dispute after Harvick’s comments following a Camping World Truck Series incident with Childress grandson Ty Dillon.

Harvick called Dillon and his older brother, Austin, “punk-ass kids” and said they didn’t work for their rides at Richard Childress Racing.

The team moved on — Harvick apologized on national television, although many were skeptical about his sincerity — and remained in championship contention. The win Sunday was his fourth of the season, his final one with RCR.

“I obviously handle a lot of situations wrong, but it pushes a lot of buttons to try to make things better,” Harvick said. “There's no better way to go out than to do what we've done this year.

“Obviously we went to Martinsville, and I said things that I shouldn't have said and put everybody in a position that was not good, but I think we had conversations about things after that that probably made us closer as people, and I think as we move forward will probably make us closer as friends.”

Childress and Harvick have a 14-year history together dating back to Harvick’s first Nationwide Series season in 2000. After a great first season, the plan was for Harvick to run select Cup races in 2001 and run full time in Cup in 2002. But RCR’s Dale Earnhardt was killed on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500, and Childress decided to put Harvick in the Cup car for the rest of the year.

Harvick, who will move to Stewart-Haas Racing after this season, finished ninth in the standings despite missing a race, helping the organization through a difficult time.

Despite 23 Cup wins together, Harvick and RCR have had a tenuous relationship. Harvick threatened to leave the organization before and also had crew chief Gil Martin and his crew moved to other RCR teams in 2011 after finishing third in the standings in back-to-back seasons. By the middle of 2012, Martin was back as Harvick’s crew chief after Harvick realized that Martin was the best crew chief for him.


ANOTHER TOUGH DAY FOR DANICA


Danica Patrick’s goal in the second half of the season has been to finish races, stay out of trouble and make progress in each race.

She didn’t get much of a chance at Phoenix after getting collecting in a multicar crash on Lap 146. Patrick was running near the rear of the field when she got swept into a wreck involving Cole Whitt, David Reutimann and Jason Allgaier.

After battling a loose car for most of the race, she wound up 10 laps down in 33rd.  It was yet another frustrating day in a disappointing rookie season.

“It was a tough day all around,” Patrick said. “We started out pretty loose and got down a lap early. Then obviously we got caught up in the accident.

“Someone spun in front of me, and there was so much smoke I started to check up, and all of a sudden my car got hit from behind. It tore the back of the car up pretty good. It’s disappointing, but the GoDaddy guys did a good job of fixing it as best they could so we could finish.”

Patrick was hoping for a better finish in the city where she resides and the headquarters for sponsor GoDaddy.

“It’s tough to have a day like this, especially with a lot of people from GoDaddy here watching,” she said. “Obviously, we wanted to put a better performance on for them. We’ll go to Homestead and see if we can have a good run to end the season.”


PASTRANA LEAVING NASCAR


Action sports star Travis Pastrana will hang up his NASCAR firesuit after this season, ending a three-year experiment in racing stock cars.

Pastrana, who is 14th in his first full Nationwide Series season with Roush Fenway Racing, announced his “retirement” from NASCAR on his Facebook page Monday. His last race will be this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

“Its (sic) tough to step back now and prove the critics were right, but unfortunately my results were not good enough to get the sponsors I needed to appropriately fund next season,” Pastrana wrote.

Pastrana had personal sponsorship from Red Bull and DC clothes that he used to help fund his Roush Fenway ride, but he has just four top-10s this year, an average finish of 21.4 and has failed to finish six races.

“I hate to quit and I hate to fail, but sometimes things work out as they should,” Pastrana wrote. “I've never been able to figure out the finesse required in pavement racing and that is disappointing, but I'm looking forward to driving more rally and racing more off-road trucks and there will be some announcements on those fronts shortly!”

Pastrana ran in 11 K&N Pro Series East events for Michael Waltrip Racing in 2011 and 2012 as well as nine Nationwide events. His Nationwide debut was delayed from July 2011 to April 2012 after he broke his left ankle in the X Games Best Trick competition in what was supposed to be a spectacular finale to his X Games career.

The 11-time X Games gold medalist, four-time Rally champion and star of the “Nitro Circus,” Pastrana never could get a good feel in NASCAR. He said that Roush Fenway Racing went “above and beyond” trying to help him succeed. Pastrana and his wife also celebrated the birth of their first child in September.

Contributors: Bob Pockrass, Jeff Owens

PHOTOS: AdvoCare 500