One Day Driving Distance?

[SilverShamrock]

I got back from Germany last night to break my previous record of 520 miles with a cool 692 miles in one day. The drive there was, like last time, Yeovil to Münster but this time went on to Merseburg, which is a town near Leipzig. It was from here that I drove back to Yeovil in one go. It took around 15 hours including the channel tunnel crossing. As this was my third trip to Germany via car I was confident enough to drive into Leipzig for a day trip. I'm glad I did as it was great experience and a beautiful city.

So here is the trip details




My C2 parked up outside the hotel in Merseburg.



Parked outside the Red Bull Arena, home of RB Leipzig. It's hosting some games in the upcoming Euro 2024 tournament so was being prepared for that.

[mjlloyd500]

1999 open at Carnoustie drove 501 miles there watched all day left when van de velde hit his tee shot on the last and drove the 501 miles home again 25 hours of driving and walking

[bolidemichael]

Back from a tour of Europe and knocked out some decent days… all fairly manageable depending on the schedule.

Hook of Holland to Füssen, which was fairly free flowing other than multiple autobahn roadworks which I’ve been told is due to a number of original concrete surfaces reaching the end of their serviceable live and needing replacement with a better surface.



Over the Austrian Alps and Dolomites and down to Emiglia-Romagna — this is pretty tiring as the twisty dual carriageways through the mountains need concentration particularly in the rain.



Bologna to Provence, via Piedmont and Nice in a single day. Was fairly tiring due to having to stop here and there, heavy traffic until Cannes and stuck in tunnels, but a roadside pizza for dinner capped the day off nicely.



An early start from Geneva to the Chunnel. Easy run thankfully and sat at cruise around 10kph (indicated) above the limit which seems to be the norm for any local traffic getting a move on. The avg speed dropped having sat in the border queues.

[jagot]

An easy Easter Monday drive from Nice to Coquelles yielded my personal best of 768 miles in my 2018 Macan GTS. Lots of ground covered, but couldn't have been any smoother going. First trip with a toll tag which takes some faff out of a journey like this.

Excuse the dusty binnacle

Edited by jagot on Thursday 30th May 15:10

Edited by jagot on Thursday 30th May 15:11

[N111BJG]

jagot said:

An easy Easter Monday drive from Nice to Coquelles yielded my personal best of 768 miles in my 2018 Macan GTS. Lots of ground covered, but couldn't have been any smoother going. First trip with a toll tag which takes some faff out of a journey like this.

Excuse the dusty binnacle

Edited by jagot on Thursday 30th May 15:10

Edited by jagot on Thursday 30th May 15:11

This seems to demonstrate that taking the French option is quicker than the Autobahn, this was from my recent days jaunt of Hook of Holland to Fribourg in Switzerland 576 miles distance at 60mph average. Including several 100 + mph sections

[dcb]

N111BJG said:

This seems to demonstrate that taking the French option is quicker than the Autobahn, this was from my recent days jaunt of Hook of Holland to Fribourg in Switzerland 576 miles distance at 60mph average. Including several 100 + mph sections

!? Opinions somewhat at variance with the facts in the same article.

If you averaged 60 mph, you must have spent a fair bit of time doing less than
60 mph and some similar amount of time doing more than 60 mph.
That's how averages work.

Given that you claim several 100+ mph sections (hopefully not in France, the
fines get punitive over 110 mph), then you must have been doing about 20 mph
(60 - 40) for a roughly similar time as you were doing your 100+ mph (60 + 40).

Whatever.

The German traffic ministry has *measured* that average speeds on the autobahn are
150 kmh and going up a small amount every year. That agrees with my impression.
160 kmh in Germany will upset no one.

Given that the French limit is a loosely enforced 130 kmh, I think
that the German autobahns are faster than French auto routes, because the
German average is higher than the French limit, whatever
your impression might be.

[N111BJG]

dcb said:

N111BJG said:

This seems to demonstrate that taking the French option is quicker than the Autobahn, this was from my recent days jaunt of Hook of Holland to Fribourg in Switzerland 576 miles distance at 60mph average. Including several 100 + mph sections

!? Opinions somewhat at variance with the facts in the same article.

If you averaged 60 mph, you must have spent a fair bit of time doing less than
60 mph and some similar amount of time doing more than 60 mph.
That's how averages work.

Given that you claim several 100+ mph sections (hopefully not in France, the
fines get punitive over 110 mph), then you must have been doing about 20 mph
(60 - 40) for a roughly similar time as you were doing your 100+ mph (60 + 40).

Whatever.

The German traffic ministry has *measured* that average speeds on the autobahn are
150 kmh and going up a small amount every year. That agrees with my impression.
160 kmh in Germany will upset no one.

Given that the French limit is a loosely enforced 130 kmh, I think
that the German autobahns are faster than French auto routes, because the
German average is higher than the French limit, whatever
your impression might be.

This was the Autobahn bit (screenshot of my GPS speedlogger app)

[bolidemichael]

From my own experience, the western autobahnen of Germany are congested during the week and littered with speed limits and roadworks. The autoroutes of France during the week seem to have less traffic when avoiding Paris. Good quality roads, generous and functioning toll booths with the convenience of the windscreen tag and decent lane discipline all go in favour of France.

[GordonGekko]

Used to regularly do 900 miles a day, tiring but ok.
Record was 5000 miles in a week.

Drove home after the Monaco Historic GP; parked outside Gerhard’s back to near Bath with a short visit in Kent was 1001 miles.


Choice of car makes longer distance driving much easier as they are much more capable

[HoHoHo]

I’ve driven the following all in one trip:

Vienna to home circa 980 miles; Budapest to home circa 1100 miles and Friedrichshafen to home, a mere 655 miles that one and each journey in a 3.5t Crafter. I remember the Budapest run took me 22 hours and Freidrichshafen wasn’t much faster due to the route.

I also used to drive to Berlin in a day as well quite often and that’s about 760 miles.

Silly, irresponsible, thought I needed to do it and I wouldn’t do the same again now.