Team talk: Drivers and the heat of Cyprus.

As one of the hottest and roughest rallies of the year, Cyprus can be a gruelling event for cars and drivers alike. Drivers and co-drivers can spend up to 13 hours a day in the car and, contesting some of the twistiest stages in the Championship, they face an enormous physical challenge. Here SWRT's driver trainer John Mills explains how the drivers have prepared for the event and how they'll keep cool in such extreme conditions...

"Since January 2004, the SWRT drivers have been following an increased training programme to improve their body composition, fitness and functional strength. A fitness assessment on 5 March showed that Petter [Solberg] and Mikko [Hirvonen] had become 10 per cent fitter and were more able to endure extreme conditions.

"A pre-event training camp was organised by the team's Human Performance department for the drivers, co-drivers and management to help their acclimatisation. This included a number of exercise sessions and challenges to identify each individual's weaknesses and strengths in the heat

"The Subaru Team's human performance department recommend that whilst competing a driver should drink up to 1.5 litres per hour to combat the dehydrating effect of driving in temperatures of 30?C. If a driver becomes thirsty, he has already lost 1 per cent of his/her body weight in sweat and suffered a ten per cent decrease in performance. Therefore, in Cyprus, a WRC driver is likely to consume 8 litres of water per day to avoid dehydration.

"The team has also devised a number of cooling strategies to help keep the SWRT drivers' and co-drivers' temperatures down once the event is underway. For Cyprus, both Subaru Impreza WRCs have been fitted with roof-vents, sun reflective glass, white painted roofs and auxiliary fans, while each race suit will be cooled in the service area fridge before use.

"To help the drivers keep cool, portable flat pack showers will be erected in the Subaru service area. Drivers will also be able to change into fresh t-shirts at the end of each stage."