At 1300 today Ellen MacArthur is still 1 day, 5 hours ahead of schedule but lack of wind over the last 24 hours has meant slow progress of no more than 100 miles. But she’s now cracking on at 9.94kts in 13.2kts of wind and the current estimated time of arrival is sometime tonight between 2300-0600 GMT.

The forecast shift to the east and then south-east in the early hours of this morning didn’t quite go to plan. Instead there were massive shifts up to 100 degrees which forced MacArthur to carry out a total of 11 tacks. Fortunately the wind has now started to veer and should increase during the afternoon leaving MacArthur on a direct line to the finish.

Not surprisingly, MacArthur is suffering from lack of sleep – she got just 15 minutes last night. Getting some kind of naps will be critical for her today with extra vigilance also being required as she tracks across the Bay of Biscay quite close the route the cargo ships take from Finisterre to Ushant. On a call this morning Ellen admitted that she was really looking forward to seeing her family and friends, but that seeing land again would be a strange concept after so long at sea.