In a cooling path, hot rolled material composed of metal is cooled. The cooling path has a pump which extracts coolant from a coolant reservoir and feeds said coolant via a line system to a number of coolant outlets which are controlled by means of valves positioned upstream of the coolant outlets. A control device of the cooling path determines activation states (Ci) for the valves for a respective point in time taking into consideration coolant flows (Wi) which are intended to be discharged via the coolant outlets at the respective point in time, in conjunction with a working pressure (pA) of the coolant prevailing at the inlet side of the valve. By adding the coolant flows (Wi), said control device determines a total coolant flow (WG).