I was going to check the wheel alignment before today. But with the kind of disorganisation that comes with being an idiot and working on a weekly car magazine, all I’ve done is remove the back seats, pump up the tyres to 40psi and give it a clean.
I have a few concerns about my mission. One is HS2-induced roadworks near the start of the journey, the other a congested ring road. But here I shouldn’t have worried, because it turns out that 40mph-ish touring on a little more than idle is actually about perfect. By the time I reach the A34, only a few miles into the journey, the average is around 104mpg.
It turns out that the A2 prefers motorways or dual carriageways less. When one Luton box van I’m behind departs at a junction near Oxford, I’m sitting at 55, 54, 53, 52mph… watching my average mpg drop from the high-90s to the mid-90s. And I’m waiting, hoping, desperate for another to arrive from an adjoining slip road.
What to do? Drop back and become a mobile road block until I can latch onto a passing truck? Or put my toe in to catch a lorry half a mile in the distance? In the end, a couple of times, I sort of do neither, flounder, and by the time the A34 meets the M3, I’m not at all sure I’ll manage it. The economy readout sits deliciously in the balance: high-90s. If I get a break, the A2 might just do what I need.
My break comes in the form of 40/50mph speed limits on the M27 through roadworks. The A2 is in its element and my consumption meter is heading closer and closer to 100mpg. Joining the slower roads to the coast seals it: the odometer thinks my journey isn’t quite 100 miles, so after a brief tour of Lee-on-the-Solent I pull into a seafront car park, shamelessly park nose first and switch off the engine.
