Best technique when driving in strong head/tailwinds

[brucepick]

Originally Posted by Lug_Nut

Are you sure? That's what I get for being stoned during High School Physics in the 70's (D-, and that was a gift from the teacher).
Yeah, E=M*C2, not M*C3. Energy goes up with the square, resistance goes up with the cube...

Actually I got that gem from another site populated by brainiacs. I believe the guy. And the cube thing makes sense. Road speed is linear (not even squared like area would be). But the air you compress in front of you is a three-dimensional blob. The faster you go the further forward that "blob" of compressed air extends. The volume of the blob and your pressure against it are all volume-based, that is, the dimension is cubed.

And the bottom line is, speed kills your fuel economy. Increasing your speed 25% just about doubles the air resistance. That's from 40 mph to 50 mph. Increase another 25% to 62.5 mph and you double it again, so it's now four times what it was at 40 mph. But you've only got your speed up to 62.5 mph!

Every 5 or 10 mph you can reduce your speed, you're saving gas. As long as you can run the car in top gear without lugging the engine or other such issues.