I have a good friend who flew f4 phantoms in 68 - 69 he told me with a full load of weapons they would put a little over a half a tank in for takeoff using full power plus afterburner it would just get him to 15000 ft to meet up with the tanker to fully fuel . he said it took a serious amount of fuel to get that bird in the air .
That is true. Although it was a great plane, it was heavy and about as aerodynamic as a brick. The F-4 is proof positive that with big enough engines, just about anything will fly fast.