O/T (Sorry) But I was wondering Is this true?

Aerodynamics? A Focus must be a lot more slippery than a Fiesta.

My six pulls cleanly from 30 in 5th no problem despite a fairly gutless low rpm response overall. Quicker in 1st but it depends what you are trying to do.

If you come off the throttle it ambles along at 20mph happily on the flat.

Anyway I agree with whoever said 50mph would mean changing down for hills. I probably would.

It is if you hold it and then wang it forward on full throttle until you hit the limiter. Woo. Especially if you have passengers, especially if they have gone to sleep.

It might be the first few times. I've never been looking at the speedo when it's hit the limiter in first, but it's somewhere in the low to mid thirties...

I suppose. Surely it's more fun sticking limit-like to the NSL through some twisty roads, say?

All sorts, surely? Gearing, aerodynamics, engine optimisation for that speed range on the motorway...?

Some twisty roads are not very NSL-able... there are a few round here where even 200bhp only got me just touching the NSL before getting hard on the brakes for the next corner...

trip computer instant mpg says 26 @75mph says 31 @ 95 :) ok, so what i'm not telling you is that at 3200 rpm the engine becomes a lot more efficient due to the cams and other stuff and at 95 it's doing just about 3200 rpm while it's doing 2800 at 75 mph :)

And that's less fun than sticking to 30 in 1st?! :)

Ahha - so what you're saying is that your beast is more economical at 95 in

What's it like at 75 in 4th? :-)

it's only got 4 gears though mate :) it's the granny auto box with 1:1 3rd and 0.75:1 4th mind you, my mates got a 55 plate astra and the trip compute ron that has been known to see 999.9 mpg when he lifts off :(

Aha.. I see how you're thinking...

No, I wouldn't hold it at 30, if I'm using the low end of the box on twisty roads the speed tends to ..vary... quite a bit ;-)