Daniel John Eaves (born 3 June 1975 in Worcestershire) is a British auto racing driver. He competed in the British Touring Car Championship between 2000 and 2005, and again in 2009, winning a total of six races (including a triple-race clean sweep at Thruxton in 2005) and claimed a best finish of third place in the drivers' championship in 2005.

Career Eaves started racing karts in 1990 before switching to the Halfords MG Midget Challenge in 1994, finishing third. In 1995, he came second in the Caterham K Series Championship. In 1998, he won the Renault Spider Cup and earned a test with the Williams touring car team and the nickname Spiderman because of his dominance in the series.

Eaves raced in the National Saloon Cup in 1999 and 2000, finishing fourth in the series both times with a Bowman Motorsport Peugeot 306. In 2000, the British Touring Car Championship ran a Class B for these cars, and Bowman Motorsport under the name of Touring Car VIP Club had Eaves entered two rounds in his 306. When Vic Lee took over the team, renaming Vic Lee Racing, Eaves was retained to drive in a new factory Peugeot entry for the 2001 BTCC, in a Peugeot 406 coupe.

This was a transitional year for the championship, and Eaves finished fifth out of a fairly thin field, although he beat veteran team-mate Steve Soper. For 2002, Peugeot pulled out but the team remained, with Halfords backing and now with Independent status. Eaves won Indy honours ahead of former Superbike racer Aaron Slight, and team-mate Tim Harvey. For 2003, his team-mate was Carl Breeze and later Danny Buxton, this time in a VLR-built 307, and after a slow start he was Independent class winner several times. The team pulled out before 2004, but Eaves was given a drive with Team Dynamics in a Honda Civic. He was eighth in the standings that year, taking his first ever championship win.

In 2005, Eaves continued with Team Dynamics (which was entered as Team Halfords in reference to their main sponsor) racing a Honda Integra. He recorded five wins, including 3 at Thruxton – the first time that one driver had ever won three BTCC races in one meeting. He also won the final race at the Croft circuit in Yorkshire.

Eaves ended the season third in the championship after the fight to take second place in the championship went down to the last race at Brands Hatch. Eaves was in a three-way fight on point with Yvan Muller and Jason Plato. It ended when he was caught up in a controversial crash caused by a rear end shove from Yvan Muller going into turn 1 that also collected Jason Plato. Muller retained second place in the championship on Points and Eaves finished in third place in the Championship, only four points behind the Frenchman.

At the end of the 2005 season, it seemed a certainty that Eaves would be retained by his team due to his recognised support and wingman to help Matt Neal take the driver title (team orders advantaged Neal), but in February 2006, a disagreement with team owner Steve Neal resulted in Team Dynamics replacing him with Gordon Shedden for the 2006 season.

Eaves was poised to join Team Clyde Valley Racing in the 2007 BTCC season, when the team were tipped to enter a pair of bio-ethanol Chevrolet Lacettis. However, the team did not appear in that year or in 2008 after a sponsor pulled out. The team entered in 2009 giving Eaves his return to the BTCC alongside Adam Jones in a pair of bio-ethanol fuelled SEAT Leons under the banner of Cartridge World Carbon Zero Racing.Jones, Eaves for Carbon-free Team However Eaves backed away from the team to allow them to bring in some sponsorship held by another driver Gordon Shedden after a frustrating start to the season for Eaves (lack of spares and an underpowered engine) caused him to re-think whether he wanted to drive for the struggling CVR. Problems with the finances of the team meant the team later withdrew from the season.

It was speculated that Eaves may return to BTCC in the 2013–14 season with 888 which didn't materialise.

Personal Eaves is married and he has a daughter who was born in 2007 and a son in 2008.

Racing record

Complete British Touring Car Championship results (key) Races in bold indicate pole position – 1 point awarded in 2001–2002 all races, 2003–present just in first race (2000 in class). Races in italics indicate fastest lap – 1 point awarded all races (2000 in class) * signifies that driver lead race for at least one lap – 1 point given (2001–2002 just for feature race, 2003–present all races)

Year Team Car Class 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 Pos Pts Class 2000 Touring Car V.I.P. Club Peugeot 306 GTi BRH1 BRH2 DON1 DON2 THR1 THR2 KNO1 KNO2 OUL1 OUL2 SIL1 SIL2 CRO1 CRO2 SNE1 SNE2 DON1 DON2 BRH1 BRH2 OUL1ovr:11cls:2 OUL2ovr:10cls:2 SIL1ovr:11cls:3 SIL2ovr:9cls:1 N/A 53 5th 2001 Peugeot Sport UK Peugeot 406 Coupé BRH15† BRH2ovr:6cls:6 THR1ovr:16cls:6 THR2Ret OUL1ovr:18cls:7 OUL2Ret* SIL1ovr:10cls:5 SIL2Ret MON1ovr:10cls:5 MON2Ret DON1ovr:5cls:5 DON2ovr:4*cls:4 KNO1Ret KNO2DNS SNE1ovr:21cls:6 SNE2Ret CRO1ovr:13cls:6 CRO2ovr:5cls:5 OUL1ovr:9cls:6 OUL2ovr:3cls:3 SIL1ovr:10cls:5 SIL2ovr:4cls:4 DON1Ret DON2ovr:5cls:5 BRH1ovr:8cls:7 BRH2ovr:3*cls:3 5th 115 2002 Team Halfords Peugeot 406 Coupé BRH1ovr:2cls:2 BRH2ovr:13cls:10 OUL1ovr:20cls:13 OUL2Ret THR1ovr:6cls:6 THR2ovr:6cls:6 SIL1ovr:12cls:12 SIL2ovr:7cls:7 MON1Ret MON2Ret CRO1ovr:9cls:9 CRO2ovr:4cls:4 SNE1ovr:13cls:13 SNE2ovr:7cls:7 KNO1ovr:12cls:12 KNO2Ret BRH1Ret BRH2ovr:21cls:13 DON1ovr:9cls:9 DON2Ret 10th 43 2003 Team Halfords Peugeot 307 MON1Ret MON2ovr:8cls:8 BRH1ovr:11*cls:11 BRH2Ret THR1ovr:9cls:9 THR2Ret SIL1Ret SIL2Ret ROC1Ret ROC2ovr:10cls:10 CRO1ovr:6*cls:6 CRO2Ret SNE1Ret SNE2ovr:12cls:12 BRH1ovr:12cls:12 BRH2ovr:11cls:11 DON1ovr:11cls:11 DON2ovr:14cls:14 OUL1ovr:11cls:11 OUL2ovr:9cls:9 15th 15 2004 Computeach Racingwith Halfords Honda Civic Type-R THR15 THR24* THR312 BRH18 BRH28 BRH38 SIL15 SIL26 SIL36 OUL19 OUL21* OUL38 MON1Ret MON2Ret MON33 CRO17 CRO23 CRO312 KNO16 KNO23 KNO32* BRH1Ret BRH29 BRH3Ret SNE16 SNE211 SNE36 DON18 DON23 DON34 8th 148 2005 Team Halfords Honda Integra Type-R DON13 DON24 DON32 THR11* THR21* THR31* BRH1Ret BRH23 BRH32 OUL13 OUL23 OUL36 CRO15 CRO210 CRO31* MON16 MON22 MON34 SNE12 SNE22 SNE35 KNO14 KNO2Ret KNO36 SIL1Ret SIL23 SIL34 BRH11* BRH22* BRH3Ret 3rd 269 2009 Cartridge WorldCarbon Zero Racing Seat León BRH19 BRH28 BRH36 THR1Ret THR2Ret THR3Ret DON1DNS DON2DNS DON3DNS OUL116 OUL213 OUL314 CRO1Ret CRO2DNS CRO3DNS SNE1 SNE2 SNE3 KNO1 KNO2 KNO3 SIL1 SIL2 SIL3 ROC1 ROC2 ROC3 BRH1 BRH2 BRH3 17th 10 † Event with 2 races staged for the different classes.

References

External links Profile from btccinfo.co.uk Cartridge World Carbon Zero Racing