Of course deep down I knew my mate had to be kidding !!!
I mean what sort of a complete helmet would risk such a pyrrhic victory over the possibility, or even probability of getting his ass handed to him for no real gain ??
Was he expecting the Guinness World Records cameras to be there as we rolled into Lane Cove on the last remaining molecule of petrol…or a tickertape parade through the CBD…or to receive the Nobel Prize for Stupidity ??

‘Um, mate…there’s a servo on the left about half a kilometre down the highway…can you please pull in there for gas ??’
‘No, I hate that place. ‘The Rock’…why the fuck do they have a petrol station shaped like Ayers Rock on the Pacific Highway anyway ?? I’m not stopping there.’
‘Oh right…you wouldn’t buy petrol from there but you’d probably try jumping it in this van if I said you couldn’t do it ??’

OK, no drama; there were two more major stations on the freeway before we hit the no petrol zone about 80 kilometres from Sydney, by which time we’d have the flashing orange dashboard light going crazy and besides, it’s clearly marked with a big, fuck-off sign saying ‘LAST PETROL ON FREEWAY FOR ANY OF YOU CLEVER CUNTS THAT THINK YOU CAN MAKE IT ON YOUR RESERVE TANK !!!’

Fifty kilometers later there was only one major station left as we sailed past the next servo at precisely 120 kph with roughly 1/3 of a tank left and nearly 150 kilometres to go to Sydney.
Seventy kilometers later we sailed past the last servo, still doing precisely 120 kph but now with roughly 1/5 of a tank left and nearly 80 kilometres to go to Sydney.

‘You’re an idiot…and I’m not lifting a finger to help when we run out of petrol.’
‘Mate, there’s still 1/5 of a tank left and we have 80 kilometres to go and I’m sure this van gets more than 400 kilometres to a tank so we’re fine.’
‘What about if there’s congestion ahead and we have to crawl for a while...you’re assuming it’ll be a clear run into Sydney…’
‘We’ll be fine.’
‘Well at least slow down a bit. Fuel consumption increases as the square of the increase in speed…so, if you drive twice as fast you actually use four times as much fuel to do it.’
‘Bullshit. Then why do use more fuel driving round town than you do on the freeway?? Who told you that??’
‘It’s basic physics. Stephen Hawking told me, you cunt. I know you do more driving than him but I think he might have you covered on the theoretical side of this problem.’

Needless to say, the remaining 1/5 of the tank began to evaporate before our eyes. You could actually see the fuel gauge visibly sagging with each passing kilometre…and with more than 30 kilometres still to go the needle finally came to rest on the little plastic nub which pretty much prevents it from falling off the dial completely…

Now, as it turned out we didn’t actually run out of petrol. We did however spend an extra 30 minutes fucking around off the freeway frantically looking for a suburban station outside Sydney, when we could have refueled earlier in five minutes flat.
I’m sure my mate is over on his blog crowing about his ‘win’, citing Google Map distances and average speeds and jerking himself off with generous amounts of Hindsight Lube…but the point is this…
If you’re the racing manager of the Ferrari F1 team, then perhaps there’s some benefit in having your vehicle arrive at its final destination with a teaspoon of gas left in the tank…but when you’re a moron in a furniture van trying to get home in Sunday afternoon traffic on a freeway…IT’S JUST FUCKING ANNOYING…