The challenge of fuel efficiency

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The 15 media members who were invited to be part of the Shell Malaysia's Drive & Save Challenge had a fun time recently.

Ratchatapong Boonwatsakul refills and checks how much fuel has been used up.

The two-day road trip adventure was to Club Med in Cherating, Kuantan.

Shell Malaysia head of retail marketing (Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei & Hong Kong) Christine Liew said the event is in line with Shell's commitment to educate Malaysian motorists on fuel efficiency.

With this in mind, Shell mapped out a few challenges for the journalists.

"Malaysians are consistently looking for ways to cut back on their spending.

"For some, this translates into travelling less. But many of us do not know that there are ways to manage one's fuel consumption that allow them to lead the lifestyle of their choice with the savings on fuel.

"At Shell, we are committed to encouraging fuel efficiency among Malaysian motorists and how it can lead to more savings.

"We hope this road trip will illustrate to our media friends how fuel efficiency and fuel saving tips can allow you to go for more vacations by road because of these savings," said Liew.

In order for the journalists to complete the task, they were required to drive along a stipulated route, which was laid down by Shell Fuel Save Tips.

The cars they drove were the latest Hyundai Sonata 2011 model, sponsored by Hyundai-Sime Darby Motors Sdn Bhd.

Six teams were formed, comprising of two reporters and a Shell representative. Each team was given a digital camera, a Touch N Go card, a GPS tracking device and RM100 for the challenge.

However, the participants must accomplish the task by using the least amount of fuel and money as possible.

To win the challenge, Shell Fuel scientist of Global Solutions, (Retail & Automotive Group and Fuels Technology Group) Ratchatapong Boonwatsakul shared some tips.

Among them was conserving momentum and keeping a distance from vehicles before them, using cruise control, avoiding excess idling and speeding.

The teams drove up to the Gombak Shell station to tank up with the Fuel Save 95 petrol before heading off to Raub for lunch at the Ratha's Fish Head Curry restaurant.

As soon as the teams arrived in Raub, they had to perform some tasks such as purchasing the famous kacang goreng sempalit and some yellow flowers.

After lunch, the teams' second challenge was to head to Bentong for homemade ice cream and cendol at the Kow Po stall.

Later, participants had to memorise 15 Shell Fuel Save tips and recite it within 30 seconds.

The teams were unable to perform the next challenge because of the weather and lack of time.

They should have reached Club Med Cherating by 7.30pm, but unfortunately, they were one hour behind schedule.

This is because all teams were driving slowly at an average of 80km per hour in order to win the challenge.

The last pit stop was Cherating Shell station, where the scores were tabulated to determine which team won the challenge.

The top three winning teams walked away with attractive prizes including a 32-inch Sony LCD television, an HTC Cha Cha phone and an iPad Touch 4.

Meanwhile, Ratchatapong, or also fondly known as Coco, said the official fuel economy figures for the Hyundai Sonata 2011 2.0 and 2.4 engines was 13.2km per litre and 12.5km per litre, respectively.

He said the average fuel for all six cars driven on city, highway and local trunk roads that were travelling an average of 365km, is 15.44km per litre.

This is 24 per cent better than the official fuel economy for the car manufacturer.