WENATCHEE, Wash. (May 31, 2025) — Owen Riddle added the Wenatchee 200 presented by Plumb Perfect to his resume and took home more than $25,000 on Saturday night at Wenatchee Valley Super Oval.
Riddle has won many of the top Late Model races on the West Coast, including three Apple Cups, three Montana 200 victories, as well as wins in the Summer Showdown and Chilly Willy.
Riddle took the lead on lap 75, giving him the top spot at the race’s halfway break. While Kasey Kleyn closed in during the final laps, no one would wrestle the advantage away from Riddle during the race’s second half.
The veteran driver set fast time in qualifying, but a four-car invert placed Riddle on the outside of row two to start the race. Riddle dropped back to fifth in the opening laps, but soon worked his way forward and eventually took the lead from Jan Evans.
“You know, I didn’t want to start where we started,” said Riddle. “We kind of tried to bide our time there. Just be smart, took what it gave us.”
While Riddle controlled the second half as he hoped, Kleyn and Kole Raz grew larger in his mirror at the end of the race. The top three nearly finished within a half-second of each other after 200 laps.
“I was just trying to be smart, not doing anything dumb in there, slip a tire,” said Riddle. “I was getting lapped traffic. I knew Kasey was coming. To be honest with you, I was getting ready to give a bumper or something like that. I just kept hitting my marks and did the best we could to keep away from him.”
Kleyn held off Raz for second, taking that spot from him with 31 laps to go. It was a hard-fought runner-up finish, with the 2024 Northwest Super Late Model Series champion wishing he had more speed on restarts to truly challenge for the win.
“Overall, I’m happy,” said Kleyn. “We had no motor in this car on Wednesday, blew it up. To put one in there, come out, finish second with a chance to win it, we fell a little short. We were so close, and we were running them down fast at the end.”
Raz finished third, Haeden Plybon was fourth, with Alan Cress rounding out the top five.