Well quite an eventful day onboard E4 today, at least for a couple of us! Tony (Mutter) woke and his infected knee was giving him a bit of bother so I called Dr Spike Biggs, one of the race's medical experts (and a bloody good bloke) and he gave me the go ahead to try and drain the infected knee. So with the assistance of Stu (Stuart Bannatyne) we got stuck in.

We gave Tony and anaesthetic and proceeded to suck some of the fluid off using a syringe, then we stuck the knife in - well carefully cut the infected area with a scalpel. After that we bandaged him up and sent him to his bunk for 24hrs with a few regular check ups. Hopefully he will be running around in no time (apologies if that makes him sound like some dog back from the vet!).

Later on I had great amusement watching Nipper (Guy Salter) our media man try and conduct his water testing experiment - poor bloke - I don't think he stands a chance doing it in any conditions other than flat calm or running downwind in a medium sea way - as we are now.

Right better be off to do my round of bed visits and check the patients! All the best

Dr Phil (or at least for a couple of hours!)
Phil Jameson - bowman (and medic).

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.