Walker's World Race Diary - 17 October

Day 5 of the first leg and we are suffering our first bout of having to cut our losses. Faced with a tough call over whether to follow the African coast further south or head west to get inside the right hand shift in the trade winds we opted for the latter.

We did this in part to be conservative, as the African route is traditionally more risky. The two other boats near us at the time, Ericsson 3 and Telefonica Blue, also came this way. After briefly taking the lead we repeatedly suffered losses as the boats nearer the coast sailed in more wind and a favourable local direction.

Listen to Stuart Alexander speak to Ian Walker aboard Green Dragon

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There is only so much of this you can take before it is time to say enough is enough, cut back and accept the losses. For those behind it was an easy decision as they could see the three-hourly scheduled reports of those in front, and they will have all made big gains - perhaps even 100 miles by the time this plays out.

Our job now is to keep our chins up as we are still very much in the race - there are, after all, still 5500 miles to go to Cape Town, including a notoriously difficult time crossing the Doldrums - there is as they say plenty more golf in this hole.

We are faced with a tricky passage through the gap between Gran Canaria and Tenerife and we must hope the river of wind that should be there will carry us on south quickly. On top of all this we elected to play our stealth play - this innovation allows us to 'disappear' for 12 hours from all the scheduled reports. Some might think it was because we have a cunning plan but it was really to try and confuse the opposition about how we are going through the Canaries. I had to do something to cheer people up onboard!

In all seriousness I am pleased at how positive everyone is right now - especially as the lads have worked hard to keep us up with the leaders. This is where experience kicks in. Life onboard is as good as can be expected and everyone is very much in their routine. Our biggest issue is trying to conserve fuel as the media output takes a lot of power, and, in the long term, we need power to drive the boats systems and make water.

As for my first impressions of ocean racing I would say it is not much different to the offshore sailing (Fastnet and Sydney Hobart races) I have done, except everything is on a larger scale. It is easy to look at a chart and make decisions without realising that the distances you are looking at run into days or even weeks.

As always the food is terrible, but I have just washed and changed my thermals (I have enough underwear for one every five days) so life is good - I am sure my navigator, Ian Moore, will also be pleased as we share the same sleeping bag (not at the same time!).

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 weekly 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.