This week I have a quick SAN-SFO trip. This should be an easy upgrade for me (100K). Of course they were offering cheap paid upgrades via the app. Guess what, two days out and every F seat is booked. So this is the way its going to be moving forward. Coupled with the incredible devaluation of of partners (unless you want to buy hyper inflated priced flights on the AS site) means I will be lucky to break Gold this year. That being the case, I booked my international travel on UA Polaris since their schedule and price was better for me. Loyalty is a two way street.