OPUS17 has the correct definition.

And I will do 83,000 miles worth of runs this year on AA. So we have HNL this weekend using the Starwood bonus at the Royal Hawaiian. Octoberfest in Munich the following weekend where Starwood will get some of their bucks back because they have such a nice program. Two weeks later will be St. Thomas and islands beyond.

It's not easy to reach this 100K goal, but it can be fun.

My reason for mileage run is pure and simple: maintaining the elite status in 2001. Is paying $0.05/mile flown a smart use of my money and time? Well, my better half thinks I am insane, but puts up with me anyway. I think it is well worth it. I try not to think about the TCO per elite mile for my two scheduled mileage runs: spending even 2 days in Paris has never been cheap (not the way I do it, anyway). But if one decides to blow some money, he/she might as well do it in style. To me, Paris miles runs are much more palatable than let's say flying back and forth to PEK. Just my 2 cents.

I think there are three kinds of mileage runs at different degrees:

1. The kind where you never leave the airport at your destination. For example, flying DFW-LAX on a Saturday evening, and taking a 12:05am red-eye back home. I've never done one of those. I don't enjoy the flying experience that much, especially on a full flight.

2. Taking a trip that you would like to take but really couldn't justify except that you're getting either needed status miles or a boatload of bonus miles. I do about six of these trips a year, and have a list on my Handspring of all the runs that I want to make. I check the prices on these runs every few weeks. I don't worry about ground costs, since there is value to the trip beyond the miles.

3. Spending a day by turning a nice straightforward non-stop into a long multi-stop journey to get miles. Example: ORD-BWI-JFK-BOS on AA gets you 800 more status miles, but it probably adds 4 hours of extra travel time. I don't do these as a rule unless they are much cheaper than the non-stop. I'd rather work during that time and get some flextime to go to Paris on a $399 fare for the weekend (#2 above).

I just did a mileage run that worked out costing 2.5 cents a mile for me and 1.25 cents a mile for my daughter. Using the BA houshold account these miles are pooled.

BA RT to Asia from the US(ORD-LHR-TPE for example which in BA F must be like a 24 hr vacation in and of itself) in F is about $15k, cost to me for the 150K miles needed to cash in a F award on BA is just about $4K because of mileage runs(would be half that if I were BA gold).

I usually end up doing several mileage runs per year and attempt to do them (as many of the above) to places I wouldn't typically go. Examples include Santiago Chile, Buenos Aires, etc.

In fact, doing a mileage run down south is MUCH better than Euro:
1: More miles (it seems most are 12-15K RT)
2: No jet-lag, you leave 5pm and arrive 8am next day - and it's 8am in the US still! Makes for an easy and fun weekend -w ithout your head being clouded - or fighting sleepiness.

The one problem seems to be the scarcity of deals to Brazil, Argentina - the two best locations.

I do a mileage simply to make up what I'm missing to get to the top level, a mileage run is made so that I can:

i) Upgrade at time of booking instead of 72 hrs, 48 hrs...

ii) get award seats with no capacity control

Just this 2 benefits alone is enough to trigger me to do it! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I feel that a Mileage Run is an investment, rather than a cost. A cost effective investment.

After reading all the info on mileage runs, I still want to do it. My wife says to go ahead. I think she doesn't believe I'll really do it. The trouble is finding a free weekend, and then having to explain to the immediate world what the heck you're doing.

This is NOT normal to the rest of the world.
It's only logical to us!

Now all I have to do is muster the ba$$s to make a reservation.

Dan

You'd be surprised how many people will think you're not crazy. They understand the concept of "buy one, get one free."

I'm trying to set up a $650 ORD-BRU-BCN-BRU-ORD the weekend before Thanksgiving, to visit a former student and her family. 9400 status miles on my quest for Executive Platinum, 33,600 total miles after various bonuses.

I was hesitant to explain this to my parents, but when I did I was shocked. My mom, one of the most risk-adverse people I know, thought it was a wonderful idea!! She insisted that I should go someplace every other weekend for the rest of the year as long as I could keep it under 2 cents/mile.

i much prefer the mileage runs to europe versus south america, but i still do both of them. i always partake in the nightlife, so it is alot easier to deal with staying up late in europe which is 6 hours ahead than in sudamerica where it's the same time zone. that's why i really hate the ones to the west coast. i'm always whipped upon my return from those.

That's a pretty good mileage run Elmhurst Nick and we will just miss eachother in BCN as I will be there the 1st week of Dec. You mentioned a former student, you don't teach at Elmhurst college do you by any chance? Couple of my friends from NU used to moonlight teaching there.

If you are a business traveler and are very close to a higher status level, then it makes sense to make a mileage run.

It makes a world of difference at the higher/highest status levels when you know the following year you will be eligible for all those upgrades and bonus miles. It makes the trip that much better in the future knowing you invested in it ahead of time.