45o36N 37o14W

So much for being happy with our northerly position! Confident predictions about the wind favouring our route and the reality of the North-Atlantic weather are making uneasy bedfellows right now. After our storming battle with VAIO, Pindar and Spirit of Sark on Sunday evening which saw us coming off well and speeding towards the half-way point, day dawned - or rather reluctantly eased into a grey murk - with a steady, penetrating rain and a sail-plan of yankee 1, staysail and full main. The soaking spinnakers packed away for the time being, we spent a damp Monday struggling in rapidly-changing conditions to make the best of unhelpful winds, whilst those yachts further to the south did not slow down, as we had precipitously predicted, but sped up and left us behind. This is thanks to a repeat performance of last week's trick - a low, which was expected to develop north of us, has instead done so right above our heads, bringing us fickle conditions rather than a steady northerly wind.

Even within our own misty horizon conditions varied wildly during the day. In the space of the afternoon watch we were variously becalmed, ghosting along with a kite up, re-hoisting headsails and then banging in two reefs. Just three miles or so away on the starboard beam, we could make out another yacht, possibly Team Save the Children, reaching along under a spinnaker! Though sailing the same course as us, they might as well have been in an entirely different patch of ocean as we were meanwhile hard over and hiked out on the rail. No surprise then that within the six-hour period distances covered varied greatly across the fleet. Barclays Adventurer, again sailing the same course as BP Explorer, put nine more miles than us under their belts, Imagine it. Done. 14.

As I type this the scheds have just arrived to give us the damage report. The formerly southerly boats (who have now come north), have indeed prospered, Me To You, for example, being almost 18 miles ahead. Although we do not yet have positions for Barclays Adventurer and SAIC La Jolla, it seems likely that they too will be ahead, which would put us in seventh.

This might not be news to warm the cockles of our hearts as we race through the dark, wet night, but every cloud does have a silver lining - in this case it comes in the shape of our main targets Spirit of Sark and BG SPIRIT. We have increased our lead over the former to almost ten miles and BG SPIRIT is finally in our wake rather than in front - by a distance of 2.6 miles. For now it seems a sensible plan to focus on maintaining this status quo and refrain from any other pronouncements about the wind and weather!