Race car driver Rebecca Jackson and trusted car reviewer Andrew Frankel broke a world record by driving a diesel Audi A6 Ultra car on one full tank of fuel for a record of 1,865 kilometers or 1,158.9 miles across 14 countries from the Netherlands to Hungary in about 28 hours.
The pair's road trip started in Maastricht in the Netherlands at 10:48 a.m. U.K. time on June 9 and finished in Hungary at 1:44 p.m. U.K. time on June 10, with Jackson and Frankel taking turns almost nonstop at the wheel of the Audi A6 Ultra.
The 73-liter tank (about 19 gallons) Audi drove through a supposed to be carefully planned route, passing through the European countries of Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Austria, Germany, and Italy and then toward the Balkan Peninsula, clearing Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Serbia, as they averaged 75.9 mpg on their journey.
However, the pair endured diversions to avoid heavy traffic caused by accidents, including an unintentional mountain detour to evade a closed tunnel.
"The last few miles of the record attempt were nail-biting as the car's computer was reading 'zero miles' with 16 miles to go to reach Hungary to make it 14 countries. The car was not modified in any way other than being fitted with fuel-efficient, low-rolling resistance tires," stated Simon Williams, coordinator of the RAC's world-record trip. The RAC is similar to the AAA in America.
"I feel Andrew and I have helped the RAC and Audi set a record to be proud of. I'm known for driving pretty fast, but this challenge was naturally more about maintaining a constant, fuel-efficient speed and not being caught out by vehicles which would cause us to slow down and then accelerate to the optimum speed again. This was an amazing event and a very different long-distance driving challenge to what I'm doing next year when I compete in the 24 Hours of Le Mans 2016," said Jackson.
"I'm delighted to be part of the team that has set this record and would like to think it will stand for some time as we eked out every last mile from the A6's tank. From an endurance point of view, the challenge actually proved to be far harder than both Rebecca and I imagined it would be," added Frankel, an automotive journalist who has prior experience with fuel-efficient, long-distance driving challenges. He has driven a car before on a single tank of fuel from the North African coast back to the U.K.
Congratulations to Frankel and Jackson and the Audi and RAC team for making it into the Guinness Book of World Records!
