I’ve been enjoying the way the Mini drives so much I’ve not been driving it as efficiently as I perhaps could have been.

While I haven’t exactly been ‘hooning’ about south London, I also haven’t been switching the car into ‘green’ mode for the short commutes to work, which are mainly city driving. This could be why my average mpg figure has been quite far off the official 78.5mpg figure over the past few months, barely scraping 50mpg.

All Minis come with the brand’s own version of BMW’s Efficient Dynamics technology, called Minimalism, which includes fleet manager-pleasing technology such as engine stop-start, shift point indicator, brake energy recuperation and needs-oriented control of the fuel pump, coolant pump and other bits and bobs under the bonnet. There’s also a pre-heating process on the diesel engine that can reduce the energy required to start the engine by 50%.

There’s a little rotary switch at the base of the gear stick, and clicking it to the left or right switches the driving style into three different modes – ‘Sport’, ‘Mid’ and ‘Green’. I have played about with Sport a little bit and it firms up the steering and opens up the throttle, but mostly I’ve been leaving the car in Mid, which is the standard setting. But I’ve been wondering if I can increase my mpg further by making sure I flick over into Green on every commute and as much as possible to get nearer 60mpg.

Driving in this way encourages a more fuel-efficient driving style, supported by efficiency management of the likes of climate control.

I’ve been prompted on this path partly by BusinessCar editor Paul Barker, who borrowed the Mini for a week and bumped up the economy to as high as 56mpg on one tank due to making some longer trips. There will be an update on our progress in the next report.