Of course ThrustSSC is about building and running the World's most powerful and potentially the fastest ever car. But to provide the support for all this there has to be a considerable infrastructure - which provides the finance, the essential services and the stability for the build and now operational team. And this is the bit that the Daily Mail doesn't tell you about, but which is every bit as important as the car itself.

If you happen to work for a Formula 1 team then around 70-90% of your revenue may come from tobacco, which gives enormous power to the sponsor and by implication the sponsored teams constant need to devote effort and resource to please the sponsor, otherwise the tobacco money goes elsewhere.

In order to provide ThrustSSC with the stability, we decided to build the project generating around 50% of our earnings from trading and thus reducing our dependence on sponsorship the sourcing of which can be unpredictable and very fickle.

All this is very well but it conflicts the key team objective - we have to remain small. As the project doubles in size we just have to use more IT and work harder. No more obvious example of this is the behind the scenes team who are faced with huge demands on their time.

The internet requires huge input from Jeremy Davey and Nick Chapman's time. The web site is updated almost on a daily basis, and we are constantly adding new technology to improve the service. For instance the photo library requires a whole new database, which has to be done in a week of seemingly totally unavailable time. The joke is that the internet team is always first to work - around 12.01 am!!

Long after the last light has been switched off at Q Shed, there are still lights on all over the country as the little support team fights its way through the surf of flying paperwork.

In Odiham you'll find Sara Cook who runs all the Mach 1 Club memberships. Sara worked for Richard Noble on the ARV Aviation Project and long ago lost her dining room to computers, membership packs and piles of incoming mail as she manages the club's 4,000 member list. In Essex Robin and Sue Richardson handle the operational side of Mach 1, which invariably means huge members of envelopes, lists and ticketing - and of course the creative writing at which Robin is so good.

Over in Guildford Mike and Ninetta Hearn look after the merchandise operation, which during the Roadshow season means driving huge mileages with stock, video projectors to shows all over the country, as well as the late night sponsors evenings. They always make a point of stopping for a motorway meal at 1am - just when everyone else is beating it home to bed. As we gear up for press day Mike and Ninetta have a daunting organisational job ahead of them akin to a small military invasion, but we'll tell you more in the next issue!

The hub of it all is in Hampton, where Sally Noble long ago lost her house to the project. Stock moves in and out in huge volumes and you guessed it, the Nobles lost the use of their dining room a very long time ago. One of the problems is that the suppliers expect to be delivering to a warehouse and are surprised that there are no forklift trucks! Sally's lifestyle is nothing short of amazing - she deals with all the financial paperwork keeps the books handles all money, stock control and buying - and takes calls when her errant husband is away from his cell. She can be ruthlessly responsive to those who phone in and treat her as a receptionist, which leads to a great source of mirth. Since the house now runs five phone lines and the calls come in from different time zones all over the World this leads to an extraordinary 24 hour lifestyle. Paper flies in through the letter box, through the mailbox, through e-mail and the twin faxes which now run almost continuously.

Faced with this situation the little team has to act very quickly and very decisively, or else become easily overwhelmed. It's very easy to suggest that all this could be simplified by handing over to a mail order house. The reality is that it would cost precious money which we simply can't afford to give away. The team works well - it's incredibly efficient and costs very little. We just have to remember to keep it small!

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