Sailing: If anyone is going quicker they must have picked up a jet engine along the way

The skipper of Merit Cup in the Whitbread Round the World Race describes how he is trying to evade the slow power drain of the Doldrums.

Just ahead lies the lottery of the Doldrums but right now we are going faster than at any time since we left Southampton. If anyone is going any quicker they must have picked up a jet engine along the way.

With just over a third of the distance completed to Cape Town it is far too early to indulge in any feeling of confidence, and I have never been lucky going through the Doldrums. They never deal an even hand. I wouldn't mind a change of luck.

But it is nice to know that Paul Cayard, third in EF Language and doing a whole lot better than many predicted, thinks that we and the man we are chasing, Knut Frostad in Kvaerner, have spotted the right place to cross the Doldrums.

He thinks we may sneak through and then pull right away and I hope he is right. We are now in that what is called the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone. The buffers which move around and behave like a concertina, first spreading then contracting north-south, are this weekend's test of nerves.

What has struck us hard is that, if this were any of the previous races, where the winner was decided on the accumulated time taken to sail the whole way round, then a couple of the much-fancied boats could be in deep trouble, even though there is still a long way to go on this, the first and longest leg.

Chris Dickson started as race favourite but under the old system he could be looking at kissing it goodbye right now, along with Gunnar Krantz in Swedish Match. Even Lawrie Smith's Silk Cut crew would have to be deeply worried. But, instead, there is a points system for each leg, so whether you are a second behind or a day, the loss remains the same.

That may be better for the whole race, but there is also the thought that this leg accounts for just less than a quarter of the whole distance but only one eighth of the points.

Another thing to think about is that, so far, perhaps it is the two best bits of navigation that has decided the leaders. Our up-beat reading of that is that Kvaerner is going well but we have been able to match her. Where we may trade a mile or two, many others have consistently fallen back.

So, that may mean we are going quite quickly or it may all be down to luck with the wind and so far we have not had the sort of deep downwind running conditions which we like and had in the Fastnet race in August. Most of the spinnaker work has been quite tight, which is not best for us. And we are profiting from what I think were serious blunders by a couple of navigators. You have to get west, guys.

Still, it is the Doldrums which could throw the curved ball. If the ITCZ is moving south then we will keep bumping into it and the rest will come piling up behind us. But if it moves north we will be through and away.

At least we have some relatively clean clothes again. On day 12 we ceremonially changed everything and threw the old shorts and tee-shirts, suitably weighted of course, over the side. They weren't the sort of things you would want to keep on board. They could jump up and grab you.

What has not improved is the food. In earlier races you took as much fresh food as possible before breaking into the freeze-dried stuff. Now eating is hard yakka all the way. We have enough for 33 days and that was supposed to be too much. Now it is barely enough.

Still, the crew is in good shape, though there are the downs, as well as the ups, when we see if we have lost any miles at the six-hourly position updates we receive for the whole fleet. They know it is still early days. There is no risk of complacency as we follow the routine of sleep, eat and sail. It's just business. We are winning on one hand, but only holding on with the other. I don't like having a boat nearly 30 miles ahead of me.

WHITBREAD ROUND THE WORLD RACE (First leg, 7,350 miles, Southampton to Cape Town) Latest positions: 1 Innovation Kvaerner (Nor) K Frostad 4,602 miles to finish); 2 Merit Cup (Monaco) G Dalton +28 miles; 3 EF Language (Swe) P Cayard +77; 4 Chessie Racing (US) G Collins +139; 5 Silk Cut (GB) L Smith +143; 6 America's Challenge (US) N Barth +282; 7 Toshiba (US) C Dickson +282; 8 Swedish Match (Swe) G Krantz +285; 9 Brunel Sunergy (Neth) H Bousscholte +479; 10 EF Education (Swe) C Guillou +592.