Ramblings From Justin Penney

Historically I've been a pretty speedy driver. I have a nice history of tickets at 19 MPH over the speed limit. At 20 MPH it's mandatory to appear in court and no one likes that.

I recently had to drive the the northeast corner of the state. Spurred on by $3.00 per gallon gas prices I decided to just take it easy. I made sure to keep my speed between the speed limit and five under. I got passed a lot, I got a little itchy on my foot, but overall stayed really close to that number. When I filled up to make the trip back home I calculated my gas mileage. The final tally for the outbound trip, 37 miles per gallon. I was blown away! The van I had been driving was getting somewhere around 14 miles per gallon.

On the way home I kicked up the speed just a little and drifted between the speed limit and 5 over. When we got to Blue Springs I filled up again to check the mileage and we only got 34 miles per gallon. That's a 9 percent change in mileage with a relatively small increase in travel time.

There was a nice side effect. I wasn't stressed out. I didn't care about passing other cars. I passed when I didn't have to get around them in a hurry. I avoided all heavy acceleration and just laid back. It was the least stressful long drive I think I have ever been on.

# posted by Justin @ 11:33 PM