Who cares about the fuel light?

Recently, a Hamilton teenager, Michael O’Brien, failed his restricted licence test because the fuel light came on in his car during the practical examination. The VTNZ testing officer stopped the test because of a ‘‘vehicle fault’’.

Incorrectly, as it turns out. After a formal complaint from O’Brien’s father, the decision was reversed, fee refunded and another (free) test offered.

This is as it should be, because a fuel light is not a fault.

It’s a challenge. Inspiration. A direct link back to our primal selves, which is why I think it might possibly be a male thing.

Fuel lights are actually nothing to worry about. As the O’Briens surmised, when the light comes on there’s still at least 10 per cent of fuel left in the tank. That’s heaps.

Too much in fact, for reasons which I will now explain.

Unless you’re actually in the middle of a driving test, having the fuel light come on makes you feel alive. If you’re male. This is not sexist. This is science. Back when men were huntergatherers, a little hormone called adrenaline helped keep the human race alive. Adrenaline is released in highstress situations and helps prepare the body for extreme action.

Like if you meet a wild animal with large teeth and have to do battle. Or run away. Either works. Anyway, adrenaline helped keep men alive so they could feed their families and procreate. Fight or flight: it was an everyday thing.

We have supermarkets now so there’s not much need for adrenaline. But we still get that thrilling, ready-for-action sensation when we find ourselves in what passes for everyday danger in 2018. Cue the fuel light. The prospect of running out of juice prompts that adrenaline rush and it feels good. I think I speak for all men when I say that I’ll happily top up my car’s fuel tank day-in, day-out, but if it slips into fuel-light stage, going to the filling station suddenly becomes the last thing I’ll do while driving. Literally.

The light is merely the trailer to the main action feature anyway. The real challenge comes when the fuel-gauge needle has gone all the way down to rest on the bottom stop, and no longer moves when you turn the engine off and on again. The equivalent in many modern cars is the trip computer distance-toempty reading a solid ‘‘0’’. Oh yes.

Then we’ve really got some adrenaline-action: wondering just how much is really left, whether you can safely drive up that slight incline - because the fuel sloshes to the back of the tank and the car can starve.

See? We’re even using huntergatherer language. I’m excited just writing about this. I have pushed my luck so many times over the years. And failed so many times over the years. But it just spurs me on.

Many moons ago I participated in a fuel-economy challenge where a team of us tried to drive as far as we could on $100 worth of fuel in some dismal little Daihatsus. I’ve been lucky enough to drive supercars on some of the best racetracks in the world, but when that fuel gauge hit the bottom stop in Ashburton, it became about the most exciting piece of driving I’ve done.

For the record, the car went another 100km at open-road speeds after claiming it was completely, utterly out of petrol. Awesome, right?

Know what you’re thinking: I probably had a support team to come and rescue me that time and I was on country roads, so plenty of places to pull over.

Yes I did. Yes I was. But don’t let that stop you in your everyday life. That’s why we have partners, wives and husbands: to come and rescue us.

Actually, adrenaline buildup is not good for the body. It has to be released. So if you are a fuel-light junkie (which is the same as asking if you’re a male), do yourself a favour and follow through by completely running out and finding yourself in a peril-or-push situation.

Oh, already done that? Good.