Eagleton Grabs Podium at Sonoma Maintains GT Championship Pace
Sonoma, CA – June 18, 2019 – A great race for DIG Motorsports but one not without challenges at Sonoma Raceway in beautiful California Wine Country resulted in a fine second place podium finish for Roger Eagleton in the GT class. It’s a result that keeps him in pole position for the 2019 Trans Am presented by Pirelli West Coast GT Championship with just two rounds remaining on the season schedule.
On a weekend beset by technical issues that affected timing and scoring throughout, the GT cars only got one practice session, but it was enough for Eagleton – driving the No. 21 Five Star Property Management / Energy Real Estate Ford Mustang to top the GT class timings list. Roger’s time of 1:48.902 was over five seconds faster than nearest rival Beau Borders, also in piloting a Ford Mustang.
When it came to qualifying, Roger bettered his practice time in GT with a 1:47:637 but had to settle for third place behind the two Camaros of Clark Nunes and Joe Bogetich. Nunes then led from flag-to-flag in Sunday’s lunchtime race, while a neat overtaking maneuver enabled Roger to pass the Camaro of Bogetich and move up one place to grab the runner’s up spot on the podium. Roger completed 36 laps with a best lap time of 1:48:383 on lap 10.
Roger could be considered something of the architect of Nunes victory since he had been encouraged to enter the GT class by Roger himself. Nunes was asked in Winner’s Circle how it had happened, “Well, [Roger] told me if I bought a good car, I could win – and he was right,” said Nunes. “It’s a really good car — we made zero adjustments other than the seat belt — and the car ran great all weekend.”
Speaking himself after the race Roger was honest in his appraisal of events when he stated, “We finished second in class behind a much faster Chevy Camaro [it was an old TA4 car]. He was running 45’s [1 minute 45 lap times] and the best I could do was consistent 48’s – which is fast for our spec Mustangs!”
As always at Sonoma, a track Roger knows well, Eagleton was very quick with the pace. He pointed out, “I did manage to finish in front of one of the other Camaros so I know I did the best I could with what I had. Speaking of which, what I had was a backup car, as our primary car had been damaged by a customer earlier in the week, so we jumped into this back up car with no testing and were still able to finish second!”
The result kept Roger in the lead for the GT class Championship and he was generous in his gratitude to the crew that supported him so well all weekend when he added, “I want to thank the crew of DIG Motorsports for once again providing a great car that ran flawlessly. We are still leading the GT class championship and we will now shift our focus to getting more points to secure our lead at the upcoming Portland race in July.”
Roger collected 27 Championship points for his podium second at Sonoma, giving the Mustang pilot 94 points in total – 25 more than his nearest rival, and friend, Beau Borders with a total point score of 79.
Portland International Raceway July 26 to 28 is indeed the next venue for the upcoming round of the 2019 Trans Am presented by Pirelli West Coast Championship where Roger will be looking to strengthen his grip on this year’s Championship.
For team and series news, log on to www.gotransam.com.
Five Star Property Management | gofivestarpm.com
DIG Motorsports | digmotorsports.net
Energy Real Estate | energyrealestatesf.com