We are now coming up to a week at sea and it is passing quickly thanks to great downwind conditions. It is starting to get very warm down below making sleep harder.

The main events today were the numerous attacks of flying fish one of which hit Andrew and one hit Damian full in the face. I now see what the helmsman's driving helmets are for. The other less fortunate event was Neal having to cut his wedding ring off to save a finger that he bashed. The swelling was getting pretty big so the hacksaw came out - sorry Lisa I am sure it can be fixed in Cape Town and you can make him buy you a diamond while he is at it!

Guo (Guo Chuan - MCM) is doing some great work with the various cameras although Justin had to do a bit of editing after recounting some tales of his youth without realising the camera was on.

Back in the nav station Ian (Moore - navigator) is smiling for the first time since we lost miles at the Canaries as we seem to have done well on the fleet by hitching out hard West.

It is a complex weather situation and anything could happen at the Doldrums. For now at least we are back snapping at the heels of the leaders - we thought for a while it could have been even better but the wind didn't shift to the right as hoped.

As always spirits are high on the Green Dragon and we are rattling on South at 20 knots into a nasty head sea and towards the inevitable meeting with King Neptune at the equator - I am more worried about this right now than any sched positions.

Ian out
(Ian Walker - skipper).

Visit www.volvooceanrace.org for all the latest news!

The Volvo Ocean Race 2008-09 will be the 10th running of this ocean marathon. Starting from Alicante in Spain, on 4 October 2008 with in-port racing, it will, for the first time, take in Cochin, India, Singapore and Qingdao, China before finishing in St Petersburg, Russia for the first time in the history of the race.

Spanning some 37,000 nautical miles, stopping at 11 ports and taking nine months to complete, the Volvo Ocean Race is the world's premier yacht race for professional racing crews.