Vendée Globe

The leading group is now sailing upwind in the SE'ly trade winds blowing at around fifteen knots and starting to get in place to deal with the South Atlantic crossing. This stretch can be rather tricky and may last a while to the extent that the St. Helena high is currently weakening as a thundery low moves in from Brazil. To the west of these two systems, there is a powerful high off Uruguay that is not moving much.  The upwind sailing is therefore likely to last some time for the competitors, as there is no easy way through to the Cape of Good Hope.
The ITCZ could be felt during the night, as thundery squalls reappeared just after the chasing pack got through (Pindar, Temenos, Roxy and Safran) and hit the following group (Foncia, Aviva, Akena).  Only the four in the first group mentioned here got through without any delays missing the calms and squalls in this tricky zone.
The competitors about to enter the Doldrums or currently tackling them will be experiencing Doldrums, which are much more active with lots of thundery squalls, which developed on Friday evening and continue to grow today.