Coulthard Feeling the Heat at Sepang

Coulthard drives for Red Bull Racing, owned by energy drink magnate Dietrich Mateschitz, and the Scot will be needing all the energy he can get for Sunday's gruelling race if temperatures remain the same.

"You go out and it's as if you have a hair drier blowing in your face," said Coulthard, who is wearing a different race suit for this weekend's race to counter the high temperatures and humidity.

"You think something's wrong in the cockpit but it's just the heat blowing through. All the heat from the engine comes through the chassis and into the cockpit.

"(The suit) is making it a little bit cooler in the cockpit. I'll definitely be doing everything I can to keep cool on Sunday. Your suit just becomes absorbed with water.

"I weighed in at 77kgs with all my gear (after practice). My normal weight is 75kg with all my gear. There's quite a shift in weight and your suit is all wet, that's why you feel so bad at the end of a Grand Prix.

"You are many stages into dehydration and in medical terms they'd put you on a drip. You have to just get on with it but I wouldn't say you ever get used to it. It's uncomfortably hot."

Coulthard enjoyed a superb debut with Red Bull at the last race in Australia when he finished fourth after running as high as second but he is not expecting to go one better this time around.

"I think if I look at how far we are from the fastest time, which I believe is a second, with the mode we are running the engine in, which is a detuned mode for practice, and running more fuel than we did in Melbourne," said Coulthard.

"If you presume everyone else is running as they were in Melbourne then we are about the same as we were there. There's no reason why we should be closer as there have been no modifications."