<< Prev Page 2 of 2 The very first Eagle Indy car debuted in April of 1966 at Trenton, in the hands of Lloyd Ruby. After qualifying second, an engine failure ended his charge early. Five of the new cars were entered at Indy with Gurney himself driving one. They all qualified for the race but teething problems caused all five cars to retire. Although not running at the end of the race, Joe Leonard and Jerry Grant were classified ninth and tenth. While a broken oil line had dropped him out of the Indy 500 early, there was no stopping Roger McCluskey at Langhorne two months later, when he recorded AAR's first ever victory.
A lack of speed was certainly not the Eagle Mark 2's main issue, so AAR spent the following winter ensuring all the bugs were ironed out of the design. Subtle changes were also made to the suspension geometry to create the evolutionary Mark 3 for 1967. Gurney himself was in the running to win that year's Indy 500 if not for a broken valve. He reckons to this day that this was his best chance of winning the big race as a driver. Denny Hulme was the highest placed Eagle driver with a fourth place finish.
In the months after the Indy 500, the Eagle Mark 3 really came into its own with Bobby Unser winning both heats of the double header at Mosport and Gurney scoring his first ever Indy car win at Riverside. At that race, the car was equipped with the stock-block V8 developed by AAR themselves. A further two victories were scored in 1968 with the year-old car and the Mark 2s and Mark 3s would go on to be raced at USAC events well into the 1970s. During this period, they were modified as the owners saw fit with revised engines and additional wings. << Prev Page 2 of 2
Ultimatecarpage.com
> Cars by brand
> United States
> Eagle
Racing cars
> Indy
The very first Eagle Indy car debuted in April of 1966 at Trenton, in the hands of Lloyd Ruby. After qualifying second, an engine failure ended his charge early. Five of the new cars were entered at Indy with Gurney himself driving one. They all qualified for the race but teething problems caused all five cars to retire. Although not running at the end of the race, Joe Leonard and Jerry Grant were classified ninth and tenth. While a broken oil line had dropped him out of the Indy 500 early, there was no stopping Roger McCluskey at Langhorne two months later, when he recorded AAR's first ever victory.