“To my mind, this will be the toughest offshore race that’s ever happened.” So says Alex Thomson of the Barcelona World Race, which starts next month.

The nine teams entered are all starting to feel under pressure. The new 25,000-mile two-handed non-stop race through the Southern Ocean is being competed for by some of the fastest new Open 60s, some launched only this summer and still ironing out the teething problems.

This will be the first time these boats have been raced round the world by two people and the skippers’ view is that the race will be harder-driving and may even be more stressful than sailing alone.

“It will be harder than the Vendée Globe,” says Britain’s Alex Thomson, who will be sailing his new Hugo Boss with fellow Brit Andrew Cape. “There will be no let-up whatsoever.

“It will be hard labour – like going to prison, basically. Not quite solitary confinement, but very, very hard.”

Read more about the race, and Thomson’s predictions of breakages and broken records on my blog .