22' 27N 42' 10W

Tactics, tactics. Imagine having to think about the same problem, every 6 hours every day for 35 days - that's tactics (that's looking after a baby I hear Kate, my wife, cry). There is the predicted wind and the frustrating nature of the wind that materialises. Your analysis of what the competitors will get up to and their actual track on the ground. All of us, to some degree or another, are playing a cat and mouse game with each other.

We know exactly what time we are 'pinged' by satellite and you can time your manoeuvres around this - hiding for six hours any changes in course that you might wish to make. There are even rumours that 'some yachts' have resorted to placing a saucepan over the satellite receiver to deflect the incoming 'ping' signal and thus prevent their position from being revealed - however, I have never liked conspiracy theories and prefer to put it down to atmospherics.

This has always been a tricky race for us tactically. We started with Spirit of Sark 2 points behind us and BG SPIRIT 4 points. We want to beat them both, but the need to beat Spirit of Sark is greater than that of BG SPIRIT. Ideally our two competitors would sail in the same area of ocean, we would seek to place ourselves in an advantaged position relative to the wind and hope to profit by it. However, BG SPIRIT and Spirit of Sark sail tactically different races. Spirit of Sark always tend to sail the line, i.e. the shortest distance between two points. BG SPIRIT prefer to sail right out to the margins of the course, where the opportunity for gain (and loss) are highest. The two boats are rarely in the same place at the same time and as a result present a continual headache to us. Where best to place yourself to cover two boats 80 miles apart?

Looking at positions now shows the dilemma. Out to the right BG SPIRIT, over to the left Spirit of Sark - somewhere in the middle us. This afternoon we went on a losing gybe for a number of hours in an effort to move closer to BG SPIRIT. We fretted for 3 hours, convinced that the others in the fleet must be making ground on us as they took the making gybe (the course that most closest matches the bearing to Boston). By the end of it we were 40 degrees off course and we could stand it no longer. We gybed and immediately began to sail down the bearing to Boston. When the schedules came I was sure that we would see movement towards BG SPIRIT and away from Spirit of Sark. We got the latter, but as for movement towards BG SPIRIT, not a drop. During that time they had sailed an even more extreme course than ours and had moved further north. The gap had widened not reduced.

Obviously BG SPIRIT feel there is an advantage to being out to the right of the course and I tend to share their opinion. For the next four days we are going through variable wind conditions and they may well overtake us. After that period the advantage shifts to the boats on the left and certainly in the last week in the run up to Boston boats to the left of the course should do a bit better. As to who will prosper over the entire route - well that depends upon the wind - and the wind is nobody's master. Or as I have been misquoted in the past 'the wind will make a monkey out of you.'

What I would really like is a fast-forward button. Let's skip all the waiting and agonising and find out what happens at the end. That way we could all just sit back and relax. In the absence of that I must wait six hours at a time to see who is a winner and who the loser. The positions and potentials can endlessly play on my mind in the hours in between. If I'm not careful I can be consumed by fruitless worrying, endlessly obsessing about boats I cannot affect. The answer lies in constructively sailing BP Explorer and between the covers of a good book. My entire personal weight allowance is made up of novels and disappearing into a wonderful fiction is my greatest pleasure. In the last two weeks I have travelled in Vichy France courtesy of Sebastian Faulks and Charlotte Grey and to the outer reaches of the Universe via Iain M. Banks and Look to Windward.