The winner of the first leg of the BT Global Challenge has been tied up safely in Boston for more than two days now after spending 18 days at sea.

Quadstone skipper Alex Phillips from Hampshire sailed a superb course and impressed the entire fleet with her tactical skills and weather interpretation to take first honours in the race. Angus Fuller (pictured), writing exclusively for the Daily Echo from the yacht Team SpirIT, was due to cross the finish line last night:

Anyone following the progress of TeamSpirIT will know we have spent much of this leg in 12th place. We are determined as a crew to improve and have been working extremely hard to achieve this.

I have never been involved in a team where the determination of each person is so high, with everyone wanting to make a difference and give that little bit extra. This determination and commitment is illustrated by our achieving the two highest 24 hour runs in the fleet to date at the time of writing - a fantastic achievement especially for the last placed yacht.

Encouraging results over the last few days have seen us moving up the fleet to 10th place. A real morale booster is to see that Save the Children in 9th place are only 38nm ahead, with us having taken 12 miles out of them in the last 12 hours.

The improvement in positions has had a really good effect on morale. Having spent almost two weeks in last place and now getting the news that we are improving is fantastic. It feels as if there is a real race on now with us having to cover and keep off the yachts behind while still trying to gain on those ahead.

Weather wise, we have positioned ourselves well relative to the fleet and the approaching weather systems. At the time of writing we are on the Tail End of the Grand Banks having had an uneventful passage through the Flemish Pass. However, the next couple of days promise more severe weather as two depressions deepen off the east coast and track northeast across our path.

Winds will increase to 40 knots or more (Force 9) whilst we try and sail TeamSpirIT into the teeth of the storm. Once the depressions are past we aim to be to windward of the fleet ready for a downwind run towards Boston during which we hope to overtake Save the Children.

Converted for the new archive on 25 January 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.