Somewhere out in the southern Indian Ocean, Dongfeng’s red arrow is splitting and slicing up the waves, one by one.
The white spray bows at the feet of the Chinese boat as it ticks off the miles to Abu Dhabi – but there’s a certain tension hanging heavy from its sails.
Frenchman Eric Peron stares intently ahead, clutching the wheel, as the eyes of navigator Pascal Bidégorry, crouching beside him, dart backwards and forwards.
On the other side of the boat, Martin Strömberg puffs out his cheeks and lets go of a deep sigh.
It’s not a sign of exasperation, or anger – more pressure release – but it breaks the eery quiet blanketing the deck.
“We’re fighting centimetre by centimetre with MAPFRE,” he explains.
“I think at the moment we’re doing well, but it’s quite hard work.”
He glances to his left, knowingly. Out here in the solitude of the ocean, his team has company.
“There’s a group of four boats that are really close together,” smiles Iker Martínez, “Brunel, Dongfeng, ourselves, and Alvimedica.”
The skipper stands on the deck of his Spanish boat, keeping pace with – and looking right back at – Dongfeng.
“We have pretty light wind in front of us, so different decisions are being made in the fleet.”
Different decisions, yes, but not here, not now. This is straight line racing – a drag race, in fact – and the reality is that these two teams have been neck and neck since Saturday night.
“We are less than a mile apart – we can even see the expressions on their faces,” writes MAPFRE Onboard Reporter Francisco Vignale.
“It’s pretty intense sailing, you can feel their breath and how desperately they’re trying to pass you.”
Less than 2nm separates the pair from leaders Team Brunel – and the Dutch team could be forgiven for looking over their shoulders.
At the 1540 UTC position report, the Spanish boat has closed the gap on Bouwe Bekking’s leading team to just 0.5 nm, and the French boat is just a mile or so behind that.
“We’ve got our two direct competitors in sight,” adds Yann Riou, in a blog direct from Dongfeng, “so we won’t have a problem knowing what are their intentions.”
A few miles back, Team Alvimedica are keeping a short distance between themselves and the red pair as navigator Will Oxley looks up to the sky.
“There’s a bit of rain activity,” he explains. “No especially high clouds, but when you’re under the masthead zero it doesn’t take a lot of wind to make it interesting.”
Well, it’s certainly not boring. For one thing, the American team has grabbed the best seat in the house as the fight in front develops.
“They’ve been duking it out for the last two days, right on top of each other,” laughs the American team’s Nick Dana.
“We even heard them on the VHF radio at one point, giving each other a bit of banter back and forth.”
His team is just a little behind, patiently watching and persistently waiting. Close enough to take advantage of a mistake, but distant enough to escape the pressure of racing side-by-side.
“It’s encouraging to hang with the big boys – that’s a massive improvement from the first leg,” says Dave Swete, sitting on deck, horizon flashing past his shades.
“We’re going fast enough now to keep up with them, not falling off the radar, and we’re looking forward to a little bit of trickiness so we can catch up.”
For all of the stress, and pressure, there’s a certain comfort in being this close, in keeping an eye on each other, in knowing your enemy.
It’s telling that, when these four boats are within touching distance, thoughts still turn to the ones who went their own way – way, way out west.
“At the moment, they’re going faster than what the routing says, and we’re going slower than our routing,” says Dongfeng skipper Charles Caudrelier, of Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing.
Does he think that the Emirati boat’s skipper made the right call? “I know what Ian did and why, but he’s taking some risks,” he shrugs.
“Today will tell us more.”