Which is then compared by a manual devotee.
Not entirely a fair comparison.
I'm also suspecting that if you did 250 miles of "stop and go" in one day, that it wasn't stop and go in the sense that I think of it. When I think stop and go I think of traffic which is varying between 5 and 20. When I do that in a manual I wind up stuck in second moving a speeds where I'd rather be in first, or else in first at speeds where I'd rather be in second but I'm not going to shift because I know that shortly I'll be better off in first.
In a decent automatic I don't have an issue.
Cheers,
Ben