Kevin Harvick captures Idaho 200 victory at Stateline Speedway

Kevin Harvick picked up where he left off in June, collecting his second CARS Tour Northwest Pro Late Model victory at Stateline Speedway and of the 2026 season Saturday night in the 27th annual Idaho 200.

After earning the outside front-row starting position by winning June’s Road to the Idaho 200, Harvick led the final 131 laps to capture the Idaho 200 victory, adding his name to the long list of winners in the prestigious event.

“I think we made it a little bit better,” Harvick said. “We were just tight through the middle of the corner, but they had a ton of options on the racetrack as to where you could run your car. I found some things that would work on the restart and then try to take care of the right front tire, and it all worked out.”

Harvick also praised both the event and the level of competition he has found while racing with the Northwest division this season.

“Well, from the competitors to the fans, both of them have just been unbelievable to support everything that we’re doing up here in the Northwest,” Harvick said. “It’s amazing how fast it’s become super competitive and that’s the thing that I love is these guys. That’s what really drives making the series great is when you have a ton of cars, but they’re also competitive. So I just can’t thank everybody enough for their support.”

2022 Idaho 200 winner Haeden Plybon set a new track record in qualifying and led the field of 26 Pro Late Models to the green flag in the 200 lap feature.

After qualifying third, Ebert looked to be on his way to another strong finish before mechanical issues forced him to the hot pit early in the race. Through the opening four races of the season, Ebert had averaged a 4.5 finishing position. His crew attempted to get him back onto the track, but ultimately finished the night with a 26th-place finish, 152 laps down.

Plybon led the opening 69 laps, working his way through heavy lapped traffic while maintaining his advantage over Harvick and eventually lapping up to 11th place.

The race’s first caution flew on Lap 70 when Andrew Riehl suffered an engine failure entering Turn 1 and laid oil across the racing surface, sending both Thomas Stanford and Plybon into the outside wall as they slid through the oil.

Stanford entered the night third in the championship standings, just 17 points behind Ebert, but his night came to an early end along with Riehl’s.

Right as the race was red flagged for cleanup, Plybon brought his wounded car to the hot pit where his team repaired what they could, including realigning the toe and any right front damage, before returning to the race.

Harvick then took command of the lead and began to put some distance between himself and second-place Vito Cancilla, while Plybon began charging back through the field. He climbed as high as eighth before the scheduled Lap 100 competition break.

Just before the break, Johvan Dillon and Rowdy Rupunski battled for third when the two made contact on the frontstretch, leaving Dillon with a tire rub on his right front.

During the break, Dillon’s crew repaired the damage while Dillon and Rupunski climbed from their cars and talked through the incident on the frontstretch apron. After saying their piece, the two shook hands, chalked it up to hard racing and walked back to their cars for the second half of the race.

When the race resumed, Harvick once again jumped out front with Cancilla settling into second as the field began working through the final 100 laps.

With 35 laps remaining, Casey Jeske, Nick Gibson and Plybon found themselves locked in a three-car battle for fifth. The trio raced under a blanket, swapping lanes nearly every lap before contact on Lap 174 sent Gibson sliding through the infield and back onto the racing surface in Turn 2. Plybon took advantage of the opening, driving three-wide into Turn 3 to clear both Gibson and Jeske and moved back into the top five for the first time since the Lap 70 incident.

Even with a debris caution setting up one final restart with 14 laps to go, Harvick never faltered. He pulled away from the field over the closing laps to claim the Idaho 200 victory, with Cancilla finishing second.

For Cancilla, it marked another runner-up finish in the Pacific Northwest, and he believes his first CARS Tour Northwest victory is getting closer.

“I feel like we’re going to get that first place and it’s going to be one heck of a night,” Cancilla said. “I’m really looking forward to that, and I do think that when time goes on, we’re going to get even faster. I’m really just glad that they built me a really good car for this race and we’ll see what we can do in the next race.”

Rupunski’s third-place finish marked his best career result in CARS Tour Northwest competition, while Dillon and Plybon rallied back to complete the top five.

For pole sitter Plybon, overcoming the early damage made the fifth-place finish feel like a victory in itself.

“We led the first 69 laps or so before then the No.7 lost the motor right in front of us,” Plybon said. “Unfortunately we got caught in his oil and hit the wall and knocked the upper control arm mount over and bent. We passed a lot of cars and honestly we came out of here with a pretty clean race car after all that. It’s not the win we wanted, but we’ll take it.”

CARS Tour Northwest Pro Late Models- Idaho 200
Stateline Speedway
July 18, 2026

1. Kevin Harick
2. Vito Cancilla
3. Rowdy Rupunski
4. Haeden Plybon
5. Johvan Dillon
6. Casey Jeske
7. Nick Gibson
8. Zander Peters
9. Chase Gardner
10. Trace Thompson
11. Nick Beecher
12. Dylan Caldwell
13. Michael Knutson
14. Andrew Rihel
15. Ken Bonney
16. Todd Connell
17. Wyatt Gardner
18. Logan Cole
19. Sydney Hamlin
20. Tyler Herzog
21. Jason O’Niel
22. John Newhouse
23. Garrett Sawyer
24. Zach Riehl
25. Thomas Stanford
26. Ethan Ebert