Hot on the heels of Honda's hypermiling efforts in Europe, Volkswagen has traversed the lower 48 American states in a Golf TDI, using just 101.43 gallons of diesel along the way.
The Golf's miserly fuel use across the 8,233.5 mile (13,250.53 km) journey equated to 81.17 mpg (2.9 l/100km), topping the figure of 77.99 mpg it set using a Passat on the same route. Over the course of the 16 day journey, fuel costs were just $294.98.
As well as managing to beat VW's own record, the Golf's trip gave it the (slightly contrived) Guinness World Record for lowest fuel consumption across the 48 contiguous US States for a non-hybrid car.
As per the rules outlined by Guinness, the record-setting car is unmodified from the standard Golf, although VW undoubtedly spent time optimizing its tire pressures and wheel alignment to eke out every last mile per gallon. As you'd expect, drivers Wayne Gerdes and Bob Winger also used hypermiling techniques like smooth acceleration and braking.
Honda and Volkswagen aren't the only ones to attempt a long-distance fuel consumption test. The RAC and Audi recently undertook a test to see how far they could get on the one tank of fuel – in the end, the 28 hour journey took them across 14 different European countries.
Source: Volkswagen
Check out driver Wayne Gerdes explaining his fuel-saving tips below.
