I don't want to start an argument but the very reason I bought a fronty, besides how good tyey look

, was because some years before (2008) My mate got a 2.0 8v shorty. We did the head on it, re-seating the valves replacing all oil seals. Fitted were tyres (235/Normal touring, probably poor off road.) with a relatively high silica content, pumped to 40psi all round. New air, oil, ane fuel filters. 5w30 fully synthetic oil, might have had the A1 spec not sure.. Synthetic gear oil in the... well, gearbox

and everything else that needed stuff, got it. No dents whatsoever, the body was bloody immaculate and polished to a T. It was laser tracked and he had flushed the boot door, mounting the spare wheel inside

. It had also heen polished and all guards fitted underneath.
The reason?
A 200 Euro bet. He claimed he could get 35mpg with a little work as he was getting around 30 before. After winding him up no end we put our money where our mouths were. I worked on it with him, we even cleaned the throttle body, paraffinning the manifold when doing the head and and moving the pcv into a catch can. If it got 34.999999999mpg he would lose. 35 and I would be a little lighter... Filled it that morning till it cqme out the top. And set off. It was to be fair mostly motorway at 55-60mph with about 40 miles on more country roads. With 318 miles done we qrrived qt my house where we measured exactly whqt it would take to fill to the brim again. (Not good for the charcoal can, I know but twice shouldn't kill it, right?) Well, it took 39.5 litres which made 8.7 Gallons. Dividing 318 by 8.7 gives you.......
36.55 mpg.
If there was any way of disproving it, I would have. But the ground was even level on both fills.... Moral of the story. I don't know if Fudges near 40 is doable but there were two of us in me mates one and we didn't spare the radio either! But I'm with him on the 35+ figure. I will never forget how much being wrong hurt that day.. It took a lot of work and a little dipetane but it is possible.
*Sniff...*