By Anna Wardley In the Pacific Ocean

Sailing rookie Anna Wardley will be sending updates from the Clipper Race as she sails around the world.

Before setting sail on Hong Kong, my sewing experience amounted to nothing more than reattaching a couple of buttons to my clothes.

How that has changed since last Wednesday when a freak gust hit us as we emerged from the Doldrums blowing out our lightweight spinnaker.

As we push our boat to the limit, our sails are beginning to give under the strain.

The Clipper Race

Jersey - 28 points London - 23 New York - 20 Bristol - 19 Hong Kong - 16

Our spinnakers, designed for downwind sailing, are the most vulnerable because of their vast surface area.

We've been working on the damaged sail around the clock.

It took us over 50 hours just to untangle the bundles of paper-thin spinnaker fabric, by which time I was starting to hallucinate about wide open spaces..

"If only we had a football pitch to stretch it out on," crewmember Tim Webber said, as he battled to untangle the mess with me.

Somehow the damaged sail had developed twists that defied logical explanation like an unfathomable Chinese puzzle.

Hong Kong are in need of more points after finishing in a disappointing seventh place in the last race

After chasing the twists round the 180-foot seam endless times, unpicking stitching and making a scale model out of kitchen roll, we were still no closer to solving the mystery.

In the end we resorted to a few strategically-placed scissor snips to get it back into shape.

Now after over 250 man-hours of sewing, we're hoping it'll be ready for a nail-biting hoist in a couple of days.

We took a gamble during the first days of this 4200-mile leg from the Galapagos Islands to Oahu, by crossing the Doldrums early before the rest of the fleet.

Initially the move pushed us to the back of the fleet, but now it's beginning to pay off as we made it to the strong north-easterly trade winds first.

Fluky winds

We've been powering along under our heavyweight spinnaker, while the other seven boats remain parked up.

With 2,100 miles left to the finish, we're halfway lying in fifth place.

Hong Kong are in need of more points after finishing in a disappointing seventh place in the last race from Panama City to the Galapagos Islands.

As well as the fluky light winds, we've had our fair share of rough weather on our way across the Pacific.

On Friday morning, our barometer fell by five millibars in just one hour. Shortly afterwards the wind doubled in strength from 20 to 40 knots in a matter of minutes.

Now things are much calmer, the bread is in the oven for breakfast and the stars are out in force illuminating our path through the Pacific to Oahu.