With the recent bump in fuel prices, I decided to see how far the Golf 2.0 could take my $$...

I filled up on Sunday, September 4th, 2005 @ $2.75 a gallon (regular unleaded gasoline). Lucky for me, becase the next day, fuel went up again to $3.15 a gallon for reg. unleaded gas, and in some places up to $3.35 a gallon.

The weather has been cool and dry this past week, so I turned off the A/C in the Golf for the entire distance. I also kept my speeds at or under 65 mph on the highway, upshifted early, and accelerated & decelerated slowly.

I also used a pacing technique, where I do not follow closely behind the car moving in front of me, not allowing needless braking (wasting of fuel) to occur. It also works well to not downshift, or use compression braking in stop and go traffic situations while slowing (if using a standard tranny).

Over the past week I've driven 451.4 miles, and used 13 gallons exactly, which equals to 34.74 mpg, and about 8¢ a mile. Not bad considering the % of city traffic.

Todays fill up was 13 gallons at $3.08 a gallon, so the 8¢ a mile is probably not possible this week, as I will not be doing as much highway driving.

It was interesting to note during my travels, that no one is really slowing down since the increase in fuel prices. You would think the increase costs would slow down those ignorant gas guzzling SUV drivers, but it hasn't. Perhaps they do not understand the concept of how the internal combustion engine works at higher rpm's, wasting fuel as it does, or perhaps being ignorant, they just don't care. Why not leave the house 10 minutes early, and save some fuel?

I also witnessed a number of those same gas guzzling SUV's parked on the roadsides for sale ;-P

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