There’s an alarming new smugness arising from the already obnoxious pit of hybrid owners – hypermilers.
It’s bad enough that Apple owners act like the God’s own technorati, vegetarians bust on the rest of us face eaters, and hybrid owners possess a superiority complex because they’re single-handedly saving the planet from pollution, global warming, and the evil of gasoline consumption, but hypermilers are the cherry on an already annoying sundae.
Straight outta Sauk Rapids, MN the Associated Press found their poster girl for slow driving, and detailed her quest to ring every last drop of gas out of her car with maximum efficiency. Accelerating gently when the light turns green, coasting down hills to save gas, and staying in the right lane on the freeway are all tricks to bump up Laurie With’s mileage. She coasts will below the speed limit on the rural highways and drafts behind cars to decrease her wind resistance.
Aside from the her lack of a real surname, when you take a deeper look you realize the kinks in the story. Nobody knows what this chick does, but ambulance driver is probably out. Going to and from her part time job at the Hallmark store doesn’t really require much hurry. Which leads us to the next part – her location. Anyone living in Bumpkinville U.S.A. can take their sweet time puttering around. And strangely, there was no mention about how many cats she owned or the needlepoint collection she maintained. Because if yarn and kittens are what’s going on for you, then you’ve got the time and mental free space to obsess over finding the highest spot in the parking lot to get momentum and keeping your car on the electric side of the motor.
Common sense and an almost non-existent understanding of cars would tell you that less acceleration and more driving on the electric motor will jack up mileage, but a special group of folks with nowhere to go and no time limit have bonded under their upright and steadfast adherence to being better than you for using less gas. I cordially invite them to spend a week here in Los Angeles and try to run their game. Oh wait, we have lives here, and some importance to our day that prohibits us from cranking along at the pace of a bicycle – which if they really wanted to max their gas, they’d bike about. Kudos to America’s newest self-important heroes, the hypermilers, whose dedication to minutia earns them bragging rights at the upcoming summit for folks who spend disproportionate amounts of time for marginal results.
Straight outta Sauk Rapids, MN the Associated Press found their poster girl for slow driving, and detailed her quest to ring every last drop of gas out of her car with maximum efficiency. Accelerating gently when the light turns green, coasting down hills to save gas, and staying in the right lane on the freeway are all tricks to bump up Laurie With’s mileage. She coasts will below the speed limit on the rural highways and drafts behind cars to decrease her wind resistance.
Aside from the her lack of a real surname, when you take a deeper look you realize the kinks in the story. Nobody knows what this chick does, but ambulance driver is probably out. Going to and from her part time job at the Hallmark store doesn’t really require much hurry. Which leads us to the next part – her location. Anyone living in Bumpkinville U.S.A. can take their sweet time puttering around. And strangely, there was no mention about how many cats she owned or the needlepoint collection she maintained. Because if yarn and kittens are what’s going on for you, then you’ve got the time and mental free space to obsess over finding the highest spot in the parking lot to get momentum and keeping your car on the electric side of the motor.
Common sense and an almost non-existent understanding of cars would tell you that less acceleration and more driving on the electric motor will jack up mileage, but a special group of folks with nowhere to go and no time limit have bonded under their upright and steadfast adherence to being better than you for using less gas. I cordially invite them to spend a week here in Los Angeles and try to run their game. Oh wait, we have lives here, and some importance to our day that prohibits us from cranking along at the pace of a bicycle – which if they really wanted to max their gas, they’d bike about. Kudos to America’s newest self-important heroes, the hypermilers, whose dedication to minutia earns them bragging rights at the upcoming summit for folks who spend disproportionate amounts of time for marginal results.
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