I had a flying weekend with a SFO-JFK roundtrip on Saturday. 767-300 upgraded both ways to C class. There were a total of 19 passengers on the JFK-SFO flight Saturday evening. So much for the thousands jumping on the promo. I guess they are flying AA.
Then flew another roundtrip on Sunday upgraded both ways on a 777.
The great thing about the 9:00 am out of SFO combined with the 7:15 pm out of JFK is that it is the same aircraft. No worry about the plane not arriving in JFK for the return leg.
10,344 miles to qualify for the 3x promo and a free ticket. Plenty of empty seats in C on all flights. I had nobody seated next to me on any of the flights.