Steve White is next Vendee competitor due to finish

12:19 PM Mon 23 Feb 2009 GMT

'Steve White - Toe in the Water' Mark Lloyd/ DDPI/Vendee Globe &copy

For Steve White this morning boat speeds are still perfectly decent, over eight knots, but the frustrating statistic is his VMG which is only 4.3 knots over night.

He is still plugging away upwind, heading back to the SE towards the corner of Spain in 16-18 knots of Easterly breeze. As such, then, it is difficult to see his ETA improve beyond late Wednesday. He had 470 miles to the finish early this morning.

Norbert Sedlacek took the opportunity to go up his mast yesterday, Sunday, while the seas were flatter as he enters the Doldrums, which should not be too active for him.

There was good news and bad news for Sedlacek. He has been unable to do much to the mast track for his mainsail (see photos and video in medias section) but did manage to re-reeve two new foresail halyards and so can now use what he has left in the way of headsails. But he also discovered some slight cracks on his mast and so has said that he will back off immediately there are stronger conditions.

Meantime Rich Wilson has had a steady, solid 24 hours and has less than 1700 miles to go to the finish now and has 15-18 knots NE'lies at the moment.

Raphael Dinelli is also making good progress homewards in the NE'ly trades.

Based on this morning's weather charts and positions, Richard Silvani of M?t?o France has come up with the following ETAs for Steve White and Rich Wilson.

- Toe in the Water: between 03h00 GMT on Thursday 26 February and 00h00 on Friday 27 February

- Great American III : from 18h00 GMT on Thursday 5 March

Rich Wilson (Great American III) in his daily message. 'Staysail, 2 reefs in mainsail, hard on the wind, as always. Sadly, forecasts look even more difficult, as the high that we have been going to meet to get some boost from the backside, is only going to be in position, as they say in baseball, for a cup of coffee, before moving on, and another high comes in from Nova Scotia area, to present adverse winds, not favorable winds. Sunny today, blue sky, barograph at 1024mb high. My mom is having an early birthday celebration today, spoke with my sister Sarah who is in from San Francisco for a visit. Happy Birthday Mom!'

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