Records and rain.

So Dame Ellen loses her world record, and decisively! Rumour has it that she is going to have another attempt, rather her than me...

Joyon pulverises solo record

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Francis Joyon, the reluctant hero, looked slightly nonplussed at the hoopla that greeted his arrival in Brest this morning. His solo record of 57 days and 13 hours not only beats Ellen's solo record by 14 days, but is the second fastest ever. Joyon's average speed round the world in his 97ft trimaran IDEC is an incredible 19 knots.

If the feat seems superhuman, the man himself emphatically does not. Joyon waved shyly at a crowd of several hundreds, small by French sailing standards, and seemed faintly embarrassed by the attention. Joyon is famously a quiet-spoken man who says little, preferring to let his actions speak for themselves. With this record, and his natural reticence, he has become the natural successor to France's most revered and private sailor, Eric Tabarly.

Here is a video of the boat that he has sailed into the record books.Of course he was alone during the record! This is it's first outing.At least , as Brits we can claim that half of the design team was ours in the form of Nigel Irens! he also designed Dame Ellen's boat B&Q.

It's raining on the Rio, looked like a front coming through last night, a classic black cloud line followed by wind and rain. Of course ever since we took down our huge sun canopy it has either been steaming hot or peeing with rain, c'est la vie.

Last night as we lay in bed and began to hear the pitter-patter of raindrops on the top of the cabin sudden realization dawned - oh damn no cover, close the hatches! At which point the fan at the end of our bed gave out and we proceeded to get hotter and hotter until one of us vacated to the saloon and the joy of a working fan. So one more job to add to the list, mend fan!

The dinghy is full of lovely fresh water this morning so we have taken the opportunity to soak another load of lines in it to get rid of the unattractive green colour that most things are currently tinged with. Today is the turn of the main sheet and the running backstays.

We are getting through the cleaning at quite a pace now. So today will be given over to 'down below' jobs, the boat is looking more shipshape by the hour! Scary stuff!