Walker's World Race Diary - 16 April

Green Dragon skipper Ian Walker analyses the latest developments in the Volvo round the world race in his exclusive diary

(Green Dragon Racing/Guo Chuan)

As I write this we are about 60 miles off the Brazilian coast approaching Recife and only 400 miles to the scoring gate at Fernando de Noronha.

This is fairly significant for a first time round the world sailor like myself as we are about to cross our track from leg one, when we headed round Fernando en route to Cape Town.

I am not sure if this technically means we have sailed around the world but, for me, I will consider the job truly done when we return to Galway in May.

So far this had been a mixed leg. The good news is that we sailed well the first night and for a long period held on to second place.

Stuart Alexander talks to Ian Walker via satellite phone.

Ian Walker has won two silver medals at the Atlanta and Sydney Olympic Games and was skipper of the Team GBR challenge for the America’s Cup in Auckland in 2003. Now he is skipper of the Galway-based, Chinese-partnered Green Dragon team in the Volvo Ocean Race and is writing an exclusive commentary for The Independent plus talking to Stuart Alexander by satellite link from the boat during the 10 legs and 37,000 miles that take the fleet from Spain around the world to St. Petersburg.