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By Peugeot UK rally driver Kris Meeke:

There's sliding a car, and there's power sliding a car - and in a rear or early four-wheel-drive car the first one loses you time and the second, if done correctly, can gain you time.

The competition is hotting up, ensuring that the San Remo and Scotland stages of the IRC series will be nail-biting stuff.

With Kris coming second in Asturias at the weekend and title rival Jan Kopecky first, Kris is now only one point ahead of Jan.

The ninth leg of the 2009 IRC championship is here. The Rally of Asturias is one of the most famous rally’s in Spain and takes place in Oviedo, a town in the north of Spain. With Kris leading the drivers’ championship by three points and Jan Kopecky next...

Driving tips from Kris Meeke

Rally driving is all about you, the car and the stopwatch - and that means going as fast as you can whatever the conditions.

Driving tips from Kris Meeke

Some people say that being able to drive fast is a God-given talent, while others say that you can learn it. I'm not quite sure which is true, but I suspect the best drivers benefit from a bit of both.

So, after a couple of requests, I'm going to share a few rally driving techniques with you, so you can get an idea of the sort of things that are going on inside my Peugeot S2000 rally car.

Well, what a weekend!  Nobody would have thought that the Peugeot UK team, Kris Meeke and Paul Nage, would have moved up from 32nd place to 2nd in Barum. And it really was touch and go. We made the decision on Friday night after the Super Special that if Kris was feeling as poorly as he was then, he wouldn’t compete on Saturday.

He managed to make it down to breakfast after being seen by the doctor first thing, but still wasn’t 100 per cent.  However he managed on SS2 to take third position, second on SS3 and then fastest on SS4 - and with rival Nicolas Vouilloz out on that stage, suddenly things started to look like they were moving in the right direction.