Like her compatriot Ellen MacArthur, Samantha Davies has been racing with regularity and perseverance since her first offshore racing experience during the Mini Transat between La Rochelle and Brazil.

The ex-PRB is quite simply the most highly credited Imoca monohull since the creation of this particular class measurement with two Vendée Globes under its belt!

Hello! It is a cold black night out here. I've got 2 pairs of socks on, hat gloves, the works! It's freezing! Especially as we're going upwind in 20 knots of wind - that adds a reasonable wind chill factor!..

Reasons to get there: 1. To see my cheri 2. To beat Yannik Bestaven 3. To get ROXY into refit as quickly as possible 4. To be able to go to sleep for 12 hours non stop. In my bed!

Hello from Roxy! We're surfing along at speeds between 12 and 15 knots, with a blue sky, fluffy clouds and 18 knots of wind.

Hello from Roxy! We're surfing along at speeds between 12 and 15 knots, with a blue sky, fluffy clouds and 18 knots of wind. The night was difficult for me, strategy-wise!..

Hello It is extremely frustrating, in race terms, where I am right now. Everyone in front of me are speeding off to the finish in a different weather system....

Good morning from ROXY! The first half of the night was beautiful sailing, the wind was relatively stable and Roxy trickle along nicely, with only a couple of calm patches. Now it is a different matter, as the wind is decreasing and we are slipping along much slower.

Good morning from ROXY! The first half of the night was beautiful sailing, the wind was relatively stable and Roxy trickle along nicely, with only a couple of calm patches. Now it is a different matter, as the wind is decreasing and we are slipping along much slower. Looking at my track on Maxsea, we have just written an almost perfect "S"!!!..

Hello! I'm sitting at the chart table, following the progress of a rainsquall on the radar. It is as black as the inside of a cow outside, so the only way to track these pesky clouds is by radar...

Three good things happened on ROXY since yesterday: 1. It is now cold enough to eat chocolate (I don't like melted chocolate) 2. The wind has dropped just enough to have shaken out the second reef, so hopefully I should claw back some miles from Cervin.

My diary is a bit late today - sorry! The last couple of days have been the toughest of the race for me. Not physically, because the conditions are stable and there is relatively little to do, but mentally it has been hard to see my rivals catching me from behind.

Finally yesterday morning, I escaped the clutches of the doldrums!! Since then, the wind has been building, right now there are 25 knots. Roxy is close reaching and we are on the express train to the Azores!

Finally we are properly reaching, and Roxy is rocketing along in the Easterly trade winds! Last night I had eased the sheets and set the ORC inside the Solent and so I marked all the sheets with electrical tape so that I had an idea for the trim...

Now I'm getting into the rythm of solo offshore sailing. The first couple of days are always difficult as I adapt to short sleeps and constant physical activity!....