Norbert Sedlacek (Kapsch-Nauticsport) took advantage of some good downwind sailing conditions yesterday to carry out a few odd jobs around his boat, such as the messy job of filling his diesel tank from a can and  he also replaced his faulty satellite beacon.  During his clean up operation, he discovered a small leak around a hatch as the deck has warped slightly, leading to some dripping in the bow section. He is paying attention too to his feet, as treating a fungal infection, which he hopes will clear up before it becomes necessary to wear boots all the time in the deep south.  

 

"Before entering the Doldrums, on carrying out an inspection of the boat, I realised that my bowsprit was broken again.  It had been compressed towards the bow on the starboard side.  When I looked more closely, it appeared that the new bobstay that was  fitted in Les Sables was not taut.  From the start to the Doldrums, the headsails were up and the load was just too much for the bowsprit.  So consequently, regrettably it's broken and there's a lot of work to do.  I had hoped to take advantage of the calms in the Doldrums to get it fixed, but I had strong winds and thunderstorms, so it wasn't very practical. Around St. Helena there aren't any calms and working on the bowsprit, when  you're heading upwind isn't easy, or even possible. A few days ago, one afternoon, I managed to tighten the bobstay and yesterday, with the spinnaker attached to the bow, I carried out repairs on the carbon. I was pleased to get that out out of the way before 55°S.  Keeping the fingers crossed that it will hold out."
Bernard Stamm (Cheminées Poujoulat) in his message during the night

 

"Someone on dry land once said that a good night's sleep helped you think.  This sailor said night is for sleeping. So applying the Breton way of thinking, I don't know why in that case, someone doesn't take care of things for me. The further south you go towards the southern summer, the nights get longer, so will we be sleeping less? No, as there's no one to take over from us.  I'mmmm nottt correctting my missstakes this morning just to show what happens when your fingers are numb and it's starting to get coldddd and the secretary doesn't want to work....Enjoy your day.  Have a nice rest!"
Michel Desjoyeaux (Foncia), in his message sent during the night

 

"It was time to gybe, moving the stack of equipment from one side to another and then gybing the sails. At this point I changed from the fractional 0 to the repaired A3.This all went well for a couple of hours before a weak front arrived, dropping the wind from 20 knots to 8 knots and making the sea state feel much worse, and causing the sails to slat around badly.  I noticed the defect in the repair on the A3 was just getting a little worse with the sea state, so I used the lighter winds to partially furl the sail and drop it to the deck for a preventative repair. Of the 370m of sail there was still at least 250m flapping around and so it was no easy task to get it down on the deck without going in the water or getting wrapped round the stays. By this stage I was thinking that a full crew would be handy, as it is a constant round of going to the bow, to the cockpit and back again ceaselessly to do the sail changes. Actually our mast and sails are the same size as the Volvo 70s, and I have 10% of the manpower!" 

Brian Thompson (Pindar) in his daily blog.

Over the past 24 hours, it is Dominique Wavre (Temenos), who has covered the greatest distance towards the finish, clocking up 392.4 miles.  He remains however in twelfth place, and is now 233 miles from the leader.  In the leading group of 12 boats, he is currently the furthest north.

 

You can see what sort of conditions the sailors are now experiencing in the Forties in the latest video from Dominique Wavre (Temenos).  No more T-shirts.  It's on with the foulies in the colder and wetter weather in these southern latitudes.  Just click here to see Dominique on Temenos.