A tough last 24 hours. As expected the leading boats made a big jump, but that said, Delta Lloyd made gains, so did a way better job than us.

We had a very good run last night when the breeze was up, but it seems in the 18 -20 knots range we are not so fast, we can't sail very deep.

Worse thing is that we broke our A2 running spinnaker this morning. It just gave up and tore right through the middle, it was all hands on deck to prevent it falling in the water, so it means a big job for Daryl (Wislang) and Jordi (Calafat) to put it back together.

Now sailing with a sail which is 150 square metres smaller, so we have to keep sailing the right angle for this sail otherwise we are cheating ourselves. It is vey tempting to sail the same angle as before, but than we will sail way slower, so we are in 'boot' mode, sailing as fast as possible, and trying to get every windshift right (the way we normally do). For the rest, all well onboard. Luckily everything is well sealed, so hardly any water downstairs, which keeps the living quarters 'nice' and 'comfortable'.

Bouwe Bekking - 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.