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Yes, you are correct about colder warm-ups hurting your total MPG of your commute. But here are some others things that hurt your MPG in winter. First, think of all the amp draw from headlights and heater blower fan in winter that you don't have in the summer. This causes the alternator to draw much more power from the engine in winter.
This is not in any way scientific, but my experience tells me the following things can cost as much as 5MPG during a 50 mile commute:
running head lights
driving in moderate rain
running heater blower on high
10mph or higher cross wind or head wind
air temps below 25 degrees
My current plan to try and minimize the amp draws and cold warm ups is to add a water and oil pre-heat system and to do a alternator delete with a large AH battery back-up. I hope to have it up and running on the red 92 VX in a couple of weeks.
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