Some kind of a race routine has already settled in. There is a constant change of faces on deck. Every two hours two guys are coming up while two go down, eat and go into their bunk. The four guys on deck are sailing the boat, one helming, two trimming and one grinding. Wouter and I run our own watch, navigating and helping with maneuvers, whereas Wouter digs more into weather analysis and I do a share of driving.

We have the most pleasant sailing one can imagine. The breeze from the port or starboard quarter is in the high teens and the boat sailing like she's on a track with smooth movements. Just the bow is throwing up some water and a constant cloud of spray around, occasionally digging in and sending water back to the cockpit. It is warm outside and the water is more joy than anything.

The only thing that doesn't make us happy is that we don't find a way to close up to the leaders. Delta Lloyd and Telefónica Blue found an easterly route that was closed for the boats earlier through Gibraltar and caught up on the whole fleet through a shorter distance sailed. We tried to position ourselves to get the fresh breeze first yesterday, which didn't work out unfortunately. Now we are working on finding a way to work back every mile the pack is in front. As it looks at the moment there are not too many opportunities until we get to the Doldrums. The key is to stay in touch.

The last position report has shown Green Dragon in the lead, revealing what a great job Ian Walker and his team are doing. They are seriously challenging the three big teams, fantastic.

Crutches are the must-have on a sailboat. Mike has brought his due to the injury he has sustained two weeks ago. Nick found them and has cut them up to support our ram boot repair. At least are light weight aluminum, but carbon would have been even better.

Andreas Hanakamp - 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.