[Diesel_Dave]

Optimal driving is one thing--I've found optimal driving with traffic can be a competely different story. It takes some time to learn, and depends greatly on the type of raods that you drive and how much traffic there is.

One thing that I've found is that, at least for most of my driving, traffic tends to move in "packs" (or sometimes "herds" as I like to call them). Without getting into too much detail, this basically comes about from red liights and the way most people drive them. If you're good you can actually P&G with the traffic "packs". I drive on quite a bit of 4-lane divided non-interstate and here's what I do (this can work on multilane highwyas in town too). I try to finish my pulse, just as the herd is catching me. That takes me to a speed just under the speed limit. That way I'm going slow enough that the herd passes me, but usually nobody is too pissed off nor am I a safety risk, because I still going at a "reasonable" speed. Once the herd has passed, I can glide down to "ridiculously slow speed (like 1/2 the speed limit) because nobody is behind me. It takes some work to learn how to do it well, and it requires a lot of driving looking in your rearview mirror. Not sure if that will work for you, but that's what I do.