Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Tank 297 - 13 November 2K11 (These 4-Day weeks are Killing Me!)

I refueled the tank of the Mighty Corolla on Sunday afternoon at the nearby Fas Mart, whose gas pumps have no limit as to how slow they can pump. Maybe they just never change the gas filters in the holding tanks or something. Yet I still go there as it's quite convenient.

So I had gone 419.8 miles and added 10.572 gallons, making for a fuel economy number of 39.71 mpg. My wild hopes and aspirations for a three-peat streak of tanks of over 40 miles per gallon was smashed. But that's okay, as this tank still brought up my average for the year to over 38 mpg. It's shaping up to be the highest mileage year ever for the Corolla, and that's not too bad for a car with over 117,000 miles on it, I think.

So I have driven over 15,000 miles so far in 2011. It's a lot, but last year at this time I had driven 16,994 miles, so I have actually cut back! And nect year is looking to be even better as my office will move about ten miles closer to my house, which will save 20 miles a day, or 80-100 miles a week, or 360 miles a month, or over 4,000 miles over the course of a year. Except we're not moving until probably the end of September, so the impact may not be seen until 2013.

Looking forward to my goal of "riding my bike for more time than I commute in my car," I am up to about 183 hours driving home in my car, and about 215 hours riding my bicycle. But this is just for the drive home, not including my commuting time on my way to the office. It's a safe bet that my commuting time to the office is at least half of that 183 hours. It will be a great challenge to spend more time on the bike than commuting in the car. When the office moves in September, the game will be so on, as my home trips ought to be about 30 minutes shorter and my trips to the office should be about 20 minutes shorter.

Alternatively, I could try to take more vacation and/or sick days to reduce the number of times I go to the office, and ride my bike for "a couple/three hours" on those days. Perhaps this will happen. And also, I have tentatively planned a century ride in May with a friend, and if I can ride a second one later in the season, that'll be a large swing of hours towards the bicycle as well.

I'm looking forward to this effort in 2012.

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