I drove 7 MPH all the time on the freeway except for 80 for speed limits… Maybe a few 100 miles or so. I set the cruise to 85 in 80mph zones.
I tracked MPG by spreadsheet and Ascent screen center. I will say that the ‘A’ trip showing on our 23rd is closer than the 22nd to the current one (reset every tank)
Highway MPG outbound to AZ was 21.86 (Not 80 zones per hour outbound)
MPG highway on the way home was 22.70.
Our last tank home hit 27 MPG at a steady 62 MPH. This was the highest so far in her seven-month life.
City MPG averaged 13.87 over 800 miles. Very short trips on city streets with a speed limit of 25 to 35 MPH. This is at the end of the vehicles we have had there. (normal is 15.5-16) Worst was 9.79 mpg over 46 miles. I packed it for a trip to Vegas to see Bonnie Raitt. That trip, at 75 MPH, saw an even 23 MPG
Side notes:
Based on the braking reports on this forum, the Ascent probably wouldn’t make Pikes Peak without paddle shifters to maintain the brakes…It needed brake assist even in first gear going down the mountain. That said, our brakes only measured 220F in brake temp. checkpoint. Very good! (compared to an idiot in a Yukon who didn’t slow down and measure 550F on the front rotors…they made him pull over and park)
The Eye Sight functions worked quite well. The driver alert message only went off once or twice on the drive home…and rightfully so. Same thing with lane departure.. Hard at all and guaranteed when it happened. Your hands do not need to be in a certain place on the wheel. I tried low hand positions and it never triggered a message. I always have a pretty good grip on the wheel no matter the hand position…just to be ready.
We’ve turned 8k miles now and hope to see a positive mpg increase like the 22 Ascent did around 8K miles…to at least hit the EPA numbers more consistently.
Given the cutoff in miles, most should hit the EPA numbers… It seems odd that the EPA came up with the higher numbers they did on brand new vehicles. ..given the relativity of the test to all the other vehicles we’ve had… Which hit the mark much easier for my driving style
Trip B throughout the trip showed 20.3 (hand count showed 20.13). Pretty accurate! I went back to my data in 2012 to check the MPGs for the same trip. The big American sedans (3) were much closer to their EPA numbers on average throughout the trip. They also had some tanks that far outnumbered them…even at 75 MPH. (no doubt a tailwind was helping) Both our 08 and 17 Honda RLs struggled mightily to hit their EPA numbers on the highway…from new to sold. I understand the ‘box’ factor of Climb and the exponential drag it produces as speed increases. I also acknowledge that these Climbs are our first box type vehicles. The Ascent bested the RLs, which returned 20.2 mpg in 2018 and 18.92 mpg in 2021. The closest American car for comparison would be the 300S AWD at 4,300 pounds. Got 23.53 overall but also almost got 32mpg on the last leg at 62mph. (The climb was 27 mpg for the same leg). The calculated mpg for the Ascent 22 last year was 20.04 mpg.
Overall, we loved the Ascent cruise! The CVT worked smoothly both up and down the mountains. He attempted to control the cruise speed by ‘letting go’ the gear itself to maintain the set and would brake if necessary to maintain the set speed. The accelerator pedal is a little shaky, more like 22…especially from a stop if you have to ‘start’. I don’t understand why it can’t be programmed? I have every intention of hanging on to this one for a bit….hoping a hybrid is in the works. Better yet, a PHEV. I consider Subaru a bit behind in this area. We’ll probably put in a better snow tire by this fall… even though we only see about 6-8 weeks of winter. This translates to 100 inches by 1/2 when we leave. We got over 240 inches this year. My neighbors tell me we probably wouldn’t have gotten into the driveway last week. There was a 2 foot ice plow bank on the road. Good luck again 
