Adventures in Hypermiling

"Um . . . well . . . hmmm," I responded.

He knelt down and checked each of my tires. The front two were fine. The back two were not. This was important, he said, because the higher the pressure, the lower the rolling resistance and the better the fuel economy.

Johnson asked me to drive the route once more, this time applying some of his tips. During our first trip, as Johnson let me do my own thing so he could study my driving, I had spent more time asking the two about themselves -- they met on a blind date -- than about the driving.

This time, I was in deep concentration. When I got to the first stop sign, I did not linger too long. When I saw a red light, I took my foot off the gas pedal and let the car coast. Sometimes, I didn't even have to stop because the light turned green as I glided to it.

Then a biker appeared, seemingly out of nowhere.

"You saw that?" Johnson asked.

"Hardly," I said.

"We don't want to get too much into the mode of driving that we forget we're driving," he said. It was a line that would have made the AAA Mid-Atlantic guy proud.

Then we got to a stop light, and we knew from driving it the first time that it would be a long one.

"Now turn your engine off," Johnson said.

This made me nervous, but I complied. I turned it off and pulled the key out.

"No, keep the key in," he said.