Mileage Run Discussion - Time as the limiting factor rather than money

So for my job I do a lot of domestic flying on delta and American. For delta, I'm willing to accept a rather low status because I do a lot of my flying on less popular routes where I can get a decent number of upgrades. On the other hand, for American, I'd really like to get up to EXP for the unlimited domestic upgrades. The problem is that with business and vacation, I can't see myself getting above 70k EQM for the year, which isn't quite enough to qualify.

I'm willing to spend a couple thousand dollars on this--I note I can get the last 30k eqm with a couple trips to NRT or HKG--but I have a hard time traveling during the week. So where is the best place to fly to on a milage run, if I want to leave on a Friday night/early Saturday morning and come back on a Sunday night/early Monday morning, supposing cents/mile is not the greatest limiting factor?

watch for 2x eqm promos.....also, europe can be done in a week end....and nrt as you mention....

i think the 2x for ns rt dfw-bos & vv is still live....you could squeeze in 3 on a weekend perhaps for 18k eqm.....its been popular, so cheaper fares go quickly....

Thanks. I'll take a look at the double EQM promos, with Europe or Japan as backups.

keep an eye on mr deals & see if you can use any that show up...

there are a couple decent ones listed now....maybe you cloud hook up from a work destination from time to time....

I'm in much the same boat. Any MR I've ever done has to be easily contained in a weekend. For this reason, I hate international MRs. One little delay/misconnect and you're hosed. Best bet is to head east to west on a Friday night, red-eye back, and do it again Saturday. Hell, you could do it a third time if you want to walk into work on Monday morning like a zombie. Depending on routings it's an easy 10k EQM for the weekend, which is almost as good as you can do to Asia but with less risk. Probably looking for something like LAX, SFO, or SEA.

If really more money than time, isn't the answer to select fares that earn 1.5x q-points? TATL segments in I, especially nesting a couple of ex-Europe r/t's when there's a sale (alas, BA's spring sale ended a few days ago), are fairly affordable. Depending on one's definition of 'affordable', of course. Efficient in that you get a potentially relaxing 8000 points per segment; fairly useless if the first 70,000 miles was on deep discount 0.5x fares.

Although I doubt it satisfies 'more money than time' but last winter there was a thread about segment runs. Key was to find a cheap fare with routing rules that allowed several segments, easier to do than it might sound, but you do have to be fond of flying Eagle.