Keelan Harvick, 13, has firmly established himself as one of the most promising young talents in stock car racing. The young driver enjoyed a breakthrough 2025 season, highlighted by victories in the CARS Tour West and the zMAX CARS Tour. Naturally, his father Kevin cannot help but swell with pride.
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A father always wants his son to be a better version of himself, and Kevin, who recently got a firsthand look at what Keelan brings to the racetrack, believes his son possesses qualities he never had at the same stage of his career.
“The biggest surprise for me is that he can qualify [well] because that was never a trait I had,” Kevin said in an interview recently.
“So, the speed and the qualifying speed, and just being able to adapt to the cars as quickly as he has. We went through some learning curves at the beginning of the year, but the speed was always there,” the 50-year-old added.
Kevin Harvick details the expansion of CARS Tour West and the development of son Keelan. pic.twitter.com/9GoCOVxPhN
— Short Track Scene (@ST_Scene) January 17, 2026
The results of a year’s worth of work became evident when Keelan took the wheel in the Snowflake 125 and captured his first victory in one of Pro Late Model racing’s toughest events. Kevin highlighted how his son navigated traffic with ease and managed his spacing throughout the race, believing those traits were a direct result of the challenges Keelan faced over the course of the season.
Kevin added, “He did a great job. It’s fun for me to get out here and race against him. But he’s faster than me.”
Kevin Harvick triumphs at the Tucson Speedway
The father and son have now gone head-to-head eight times in the CARS Tour, with Keelan emerging on top in five of those encounters. Their first meeting of 2026 came at Tucson Speedway during the Spears CARS Tour West season, where Kevin appeared to draw a clear line. For better or worse, he decided he was done pulling punches and raced his son with ruthless intensity.
The two traded paint repeatedly in the closing laps, and Kevin ultimately delivered a firm nudge to Keelan’s bumper before driving on to Victory Lane. Those hard lessons should only serve Keelan well in the long run, especially if he hopes to one day compete in the aggression-heavy NASCAR Cup Series. With that, anticipation for their next showdown is already sky-high.
