34:18.03N 58:54.54W

As the winds built on day two and having looked at the forecast we decided the Tradewind sail would be surplus to requirements, so we set about putting it away only to find that it was stuck hard on the pulley at the top of the mast. We briefly thought about climbing the mast to free it and quickly dismissed this idea in favour of furling it tightly in the hope that it wouldn’t unfurl itself in stronger winds to come to cause havoc.

We furled out then head sail which would need to be out sail of choice for the next twelve days and the Tradewind sail seem to sit furled behind it without ay issues so everything crossed.

In the afternoon on my watch about 3pm the seas started to kick up and out of nowhere came incredibly strong winds, emergency reefing left me helming in 40-50 knot winds. We hailed one of the boats ahead of us to see if they had the same and they reported just 25 knots 2 miles ahead, so we kept steady course for half an hour during which time all the excess wind alarms kept triggering on the instruments. Eventually winds returned to normal 20-25 knots but as night was falling, we decided not to shake out the reefs but to get some well-earned rest

In the evening Mark treated us to pork and bean stew which was well received and overnight because of our reduced sails we were overtaken by quite a few of the fleet, we had created a little clique of about ten boats all clumped together on the screen following each other in a pack.

As dawn came we shook out the reefs and chased our way back into the pack reasonable successfully looking at the leader board we are now 20^th but making up on the pack with still some 1,460 miles to go.