In terms of Ericsson 3’s monopoly on this leg, Magnus Olsson and his men haven’t quite gone from owning three hotels on Boardwalk to a one-bed apartment on Mediterranean Avenue, but the gaps to their closest pursuers – Ericsson 4 and PUMA – have shrunk.

With their progress to Cape Horn temporarily hitting the buffers at the second ice gate, the chasing duo have gained over 160 miles in the past 24 hours as the numbers in the DTLC (Distance To Leader Change) column on the leaderboard went from red to green.

By the 16:00 GMT Position Report, those numbers against the sistership (+109) and the shoe boat (+141) were behaving like traffic lights, green/red/green, as the Nordics led the charge south at 14-18 knots. Next stop, the Horn, 1,744 miles away for Ericsson 3.

According to PUMA skipper Ken Read, even though they are sailing “their own race”, there are anxious glances over the shoulder at Green Dragon.

For the Dragon (+432), a northern gamble is on the cards at the second ice gate in a few hours’ time. Whether they snub convention as Aksel Magdahl did seven days ago, remains to be seen. For Telefonica Blue (+788), the horror story rumbles on.

But if you thought it was all plain sailing on the good ship Ericsson 3, Media Crew Member Gustav Morin, says you’d be mistaken. The 8,000 miles of the marathon Leg 5 to date have tested the crew’s endurance – physically and psychologically, he wrote in an email this morning.

"It's about routines with food, sleep and hygiene and above all it's about how much you can push your crew and the boat. Right now we are working our guts out not to lose the lead we have been working so hard to get,” he said.

"Our navigator’s choice to go north and catch on to a low pressure after the first scoring gate paid off and today we passed the second ice gate a couple of hours ahead.

"We wanted to be able to hang on to the low a bit longer but unfortunately we dropped out and lost a lot of pace so the others have been able to make depressingly big gains on us. Right after the ice gate we stopped completely for a while. Losing up to 50 miles in one sched is not fun.”

Conceding miles by the hour when you are the distant backmarker is not exactly a barrel of laughs either. Welcome to the world of Telefonica Blue.

Bouwe Bekking and his men have been fighting the ill-effects of two areas of high pressure lying in their path to the second ice gate, 1,500 miles west of Chile at 45S between 120W and 105W.

For Bekking and navigator Tom Addis, high pressure means light air and dark moods. And with the pain comes the rain.

“We have had torrential rain the entire day, and not much breeze,” Bekking said. “Right now the breeze is dropping further, only seven knots. Painful and raining even harder. The guys on deck look like soaked cats.

"There are still 700 miles to go to the second ice waypoint and with these speeds at least another three days to go.”

At least the scenery, between the showers, is pleasant even if nature doesn’t care too much for the plight of a Volvo Open 70 stuck at the back of the fleet. “This morning we passed a big group of pilot whales, who didn't show any interest in us, but for us it was good to see something else other than just the grey skies.

"As I type, the breeze has dropped to a mere 4 knots, boat speed 3.5 knots, did we deserve this? I guess so.”

Team-mate Simon Fisher added that a descent into gallows humour has helped them cope. "The mood on board is pretty interesting to be honest as we all swing between lamenting the desperate situation we are in and trying to stay positive and happy and keep morale up,” he said.

"The good thing is that most of the time we are laughing and the more we fall behind the more we seem to laugh at stupid stuff. Perhaps we are all going crazy I guess we will have to wait until Rio to find out when 11 wild-eyed, hairy, unshaven blokes step off the boat back into civilization after over a month at sea.”

As supplies also become a topic for debate on day 27 of what could turn out to be 40 days and 40 nights, Ericsson 4's Brazilian trimmer Horacio Carabelli provided a unique insight into the cuisine on board. If you are of a delicate disposition – look away now.

"Regards the food department, some new Chinese delicacies have been showing up as promised by the food managers,” he wrote.

“We already had meat sticks and square pig pieces that would have been difficult for even my dog. The new product is a dry meat that looks like it has hair on it, and even has a cow on its plastic wrapping. It looks like a dried dead rat. Looks like these snacks are in the bags all the way to Rio, so I’ll skip the Chinese gastronomy.”