Francesca Clapcich in Route du Rhum-Destination Guadeloupe - Day 3

Approaching the end of her third day at sea in the Route du Rhum, Francesca is tempering her joy at having climbed from seventh to third place overall over the last 24 hours with anxiety about what happens next.

North of the Azores right now, the endless expanse of the Atlantic ocean is like a snakes and ladders board as the leading IMOCA skippers tackle a stationary weather front, which has ensnared several of them in light winds, while allowing Francesca and the German skipper Boris Herrmann on Malizia 4 to climb the rankings.

This morning Francesca was 180 nautical miles behind the leader - Corentin Horeau of France on board MACSF - who alone managed to cross the front and take advantage of strong northerly winds. And she is only a couple of miles behind Herrmann but well south of him at a position about 375 miles north-northwest of Ponta Delgada in the Azores.

However, 11th Hour Racing is still surrounded by light winds and in Francesca's mind the skippers to the north and west of her - Elodie Bonafous, Ambrogio Beccaria and Sam Goodchild - could still bounce back in stronger winds. Not only that, skippers to east of her, among them the now fourth-placed Maxime Sorel, are a threat too.

Here's how she put it in her voicenote from the cockpit this morning as 11th Hour Racing continued southwards on a broad reach in a light easterly airflow: "Of course I'm pretty happy that I was able to take advantage a little bit of the unfortunate situation that the leading group had yesterday. At the same time, though, I am in this big patch of light wind. It seems that the boats further west are able to sail a bit lower overall, and the boats further east are actually able to sail a bit faster and lower too. So I am a bit stuck in-between.

"I have been trimming the sails quite a lot during the night," she added. "It's been so up and down - really, really shifty. So it's not been super-easy. And of course the guys in the north have more wind coming down, so I think in the end it can still pan out pretty good for them. It's about positioning, it's about what's coming next."

Later in the message she returned to the dilemma of whether to continue south or gybe more to the west to close the lateral gap on those coming up from behind. "I was tempted a few times to get into a gybe and just try to get a bit further west, but then every time I was preparing for the gybe the wind was coming back and I paused..." she said.

The next challenge, which Francesca is already focusing on, is a developing and deep area of low pressure that will dominate the area to the north of the Azores by tomorrow. This will produce the strongest winds of the race so far and potentially rough seas, depending on how the system develops.

"I think from the position where I am right now, the option is to manage it from the southeast side, so I will have a slightly tighter angle and hopefully a bit less wind - so a bit more reaching, but still in like 30-plus knots," Francesca explained. "If someone is able to hook it from the other side, it will be really strong but in downwind conditions. So it depends how further the group in the north is able to go."

Francesca knows that this race is far from over. "It's still a really, really, really long race, so nothing is clear at the moment. I think almost everybody still has a lot of doors open, so I am happy with where I am right now, but I am not sure it's going to last forever. The race is long, I just need to focus on each step," she said.

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