Skipper's log: Adrien Hardy (France), Crédit Mutuel (leader of Class40)

"It's okay, we’re into the thick of things now. We’ve been stalled for two or three hours. There were a few squalls yesterday with a southeast wind, but the southerly wind has become very weak. We hope it won’t last too long. It’s not easy, we’ve seen the forecasts, we have to stay close to the most direct route, and tack as directly south as we can. There is a lot of swell, the boat is being thrown around, we’ll have to find a tack where that carries us. It's a radical change of atmosphere, yesterday, we were riding along at 15/20 knots and now I'm standing in the boat, and it’s not moving at all. We’re waiting for the new south-east wind to kick back in.

"We’ve more work ahead, more manoeuvring; we have to adapt to the squalls continually, but now it’s very quiet. We’re waiting for the next clouds.

"We’re not looking too far behind us, we just have to get south as fast as possible; there’s nothing we can do, we just have to stay calm, it’ll be like that for one or two days. When you see that the IMOCA have still not got going again, it's not encouraging.

"I have to prepare something for Ian's first equator, it's an important moment in a sailor's life - I still have some time to think about it!"