MAKING WAVES:Lady Luck's wheel has turned in our favour. Thanks to a slip-up by Telefonica during the In-Port race on Saturday, we are within 16 points of first place

THIS IS nice, lovely sailing.

Blue skies, flat seas, warm and completely different to just over a month ago when we were exiting the Southern Ocean and passing Cape Horn. We could do with just a bit more breeze but that’ll come soon enough, once we get this transition zone out of the way and we find the trade winds.

After leaving Itajai in southern Brazil on Sunday afternoon, we had a fast getaway in 20 knots of wind as we sped north before running into light airs more or less as usual east of Rio de Janeiro. This is our sixth leg of the race and even though there’s barely 10 weeks remaining before the final In-Port race on Galway Bay, there’s about 45 per cent of the overall points left to be scored.

After the sudden developments of the last leg, everything will now hinge on what happens over the coming week as far as the overall race standings go.

Last month, we had a spate of boat breakages that first hit Mike Sanderson on Team Sanya, who won’t rejoin the race until Miami in a couple of weeks’ time. Then Ian Walker’s Abu Dhabi Ocean racing had a double-whammy of hull construction issues and retired from the leg to ship from Chile to Brazil.

Chris Nicholson’s Camper team had to make temporary repairs in Chile just to complete the leg and placed fourth, while overall race leader Iker Martinez on Telefonica also suspended racing for 17 hours to make repairs.

And then we got dismasted while we were leading the fleet and hobbled across the finishing line in third place under jury rig.

That left just Ken Read on Puma unscathed for the leg, while the Telefonica lads staged a remarkable comeback to match-race the Americans to the finish but had to settle for second place.

Had we won and Read placed second, we would have been just five points behind the Spaniards for the overall race standings but instead, we dropped back to 20 behind while holding second place overall.

For a while, overtaking Iker and the lads looked daunting even though it’s still entirely possible.

And then Lady Luck’s wheel turned in our favour. On Saturday during the Itajai In-Port race, someone on Telefonica – skipper, navigator or tactician – screwed up and badly by missing the correct mark on the course and had to turn back, which allowed the rest of the fleet to sail by.

We had been second on the water but were lifted to first place, adding to our previous second and third places for other In-Port races and a boost to our confidence that dispels notions we don’t do as well on the inshore courses as we do offshore.

Mind you, our leg six start on Sunday was nothing to gloat about as we had a series of sail-handling and selection issues that left us trailing the pack for the first few hours and we’ve been suffering ever since.

Puma showed blistering pace and confirmed their potential that is increasing as they move towards overtaking Camper for third place and possibly higher, all the time putting their own dismasting and retirement in leg one behind them.

Right now, Read, along with Martinez and ourselves on Groupama 4, has opted to take the offshore route up the coast which is longer but we should get better breeze eventually. All three of us are Juan Kouyoumidjan designs and have proven consistently faster than Abu Dhabi and Camper that have opted for the inshore route at the moment, possibly hoping for a break in the conditions.

Right now, the official positions shows us lagging by about 40 miles but that’s because we’re deeper offshore than the other two by around 100 miles, while Walker and Nicholson are only a dozen miles off the coast.

Within the next day or so, we should reach the trade winds off the coast of Recife or Natal and we can start our run to the doldrums for the fourth and final time this race. Whoever breaks through first will be in a commanding position.

From here, it’s a raw boat-speed test up past the Caribbean and into the Bahamas before the finish in Miami. By this time next week, we should be passing the island of Guadeloupe in the region that was home to me for seven years. A quick stop there for a “petit punch” or a cold beer in Falmouth would be tempting for sure but we have Telefonica firmly in our sights.

Their slip-up on Saturday brought us to within 16 points of first place. If we beat them by one place in the next three legs, this edition of the Volvo Ocean Race could be decided by In-Port races and the final stage into Galway in July. It’s all to sail for.