Day 2 1730hrs:  According to many weather forecasters, right now we should be getting a fine hearty breeze from the south to southwest all along the south coast as the day’s rain clears to the eastward writes W M Nixon. Yet a quick reference to wind reports from Roche’s Point shows that at 1634hrs there were light southeast to east breezes in the immediate area.

Off the entrance to Cork Harbour, a cluster of boats in the Volvo Round Ireland Race are finding it difficult to get their speeds above 5 knots, even though offshore the underlying wind is in the expected direction. But there’s just not a lot of it. Even the mighty Teasing Machine (Eric de Turckheim) still has to get to the Fastnet, though she is closing in on it and in recent minutes her speed has gone up from less than 6 knots to 7. She is still at the top of the IRC leaderboard, first in class and second overall to Rambler 88, which is finding all the wind she wants as she sweeps past Eagle Island at 23.8 knots.

Oman sail – her 2015 Round Ireland speed record is under pressure if current predictions hold true tonight

The reality is that we are now looking at four different races. Firstly, there’s the contest of the MOD 70s, which passed the most northerly point at Inishtrahull with Ned Collier Wakefield in command of Concise 10 leading with five miles in hand on Lloyd Thornburg’s Phaedo 3 and eight miles on Sidney Gavignet’s Musandam Oman (See video interview with Oman Sail's Irish crew Damian Foxall). Concise 10’s performance has been remarkable as Phaedo was able to keep her under close control and astern during the RORC Caribbean 600 in February, yet from an early stage in this race Ned Collier Wakefield and his team have got ahead and stayed there, often by quite substantial distances, but even as we write their speed has dropped to 16 knots while the other two are still in the 20s.

In IRC 4 division the J97 Lambay Rules (Stephen Quinn) from Howth is lying second

Ether way, the new flood tide into the North Channel will barrel them along all the way to the South Rock Light off the County Down coast, but thereafter they may find the Irish Sea serving up headwinds for the final eighty miles to Wicklow. A toppling of Sidney Gavignet’s unlimited record, set in May 2015, of 1 day 16 hours and 51 minutes is possible as they’d have to be finished by 8 o’clock in the morning, but even while we’re writing this they’ve got to Rathlin Island, so who knows?

The second “Race Within A Race” is simply Rambler 88 racing against herself and striving to better both Mike Slade’s race record with Leopard in 2008 of 2 days 17 hours and 48 minutes, and Jean-Philippe Chomette’s 2006 open record of 2 days 9 hours and 41 minutes with the Open 60 CityJet/Solene. While the latter seems increasingly unlikely, the former is still eminently do-able. Meanwhile, as Rambler has enjoyed more breeze - and a fair wind at that - than the rest of the mono-hull fleet for all of today so far, she is well ahead in IRC 1 overall.

The third “Race Within A Race” is really the Volvo Round Ireland Rae as most of us know and understand “normal” modern offshore racing, as it’s the rest of the typical 21st Century fleet which is now spread out between Teasing Machine at the Fastnet and Fulmar Fever, Robert Marchant’s Fumar 32, close southeast of Ardmore in West Waterford.

At times the sailing has been more than very rugged, and the First 40 Medicare First Aid (Joe Conway) has retired into Ballycotton, while the Dehler 37 Port of Galway (Martin Breen & Nigel Moss) has pulled into Crosshaven though her retiral is not yet officially confirmed, while Keith Miller’s Yamaha 36 Andante also looks to be heading for home. These are in addition to the first two retirements reported by Afloat.ie earlier this afternoon.

But among those still in the hunt, the placings at 1800hrs Sunday are:

IRC Overall: 1st Rambler 88 (George David), 2nd Teasing Machine (Eric de Turckheim, 3rd Euro Car Parks (Dave Cullen), 4th Mojito (Peter Dunlop & Vicky Cox), 5th Lisa (Michael Boyd, 6th Sarabande (Robert Mabley).

IRC 1 1st Teasing Machine, 2nd Lisa, 3rd Katsu (Alan Hannon)

IRC 2 1st Sarabande, (Robert Mabley) 2nd Aurelia (Chris & Patanne Power Smith, 3rd Fujitsu (Donal Ryan)

IRC 3 1st Euro Car Parks, 2nd Mojito, 3rd Rockabill VI (Paul O’Higgins).

IRC 4 1st Groupe 5 (Patrice Carpentier), 2nd Lambay Rules (Stephen Quinn), 3rd Cavatina (Ian Hickey).

Two-handed: 1st Groupe 5, 2nd Bellino (Rob Craige), 3rd Just Plain Crazy(Ian Knight)

Two particularly outstanding performances during today have been put in by Groupe 5 (Patrice Carpentier), a Sunfast 3200 which is leading both her open class and the two-handed division, and the J/109 Euro Car Parks (David Cullen) which has been reinforcing the Lazarus act which began in the small hours, and currently is pacing confidently with larger boats down off Seven Heads.

As for the fourth “Race Within A Race”, that is of course another boat racing with herself, but the 1937-vintage 43ft gaff ketch Maybird (Darryl Hughes) could not be more different from Rambler 88. Yet she is still slugging gallantly away, having finally put the Coningbeg Light off the Saltees astern, so if you’re in contact with any of Maybird’s crew, do send them some words of encouragement.

See Round Ireland tracker here and keep to up to date with the fleet's progress with Afloat's regular Round Ireland 2016 updates here