Leg 1, Days 2-3-4

Leg 1 Day 2
I managed little sleep the first night, helming continuously through the strong winds until it moderated a little. By morning I was exhausted. A summary of my sail changes from the start till 1000 next morning:
No3-Spinnaker-No1-No3-Reef1-No4-Reef2-Reef2 out-Reef1 out-No1. This would be a lot for a fully crewed yacht, hard grind for a single-hander.
During the morning I past the 42ft Tamarind who later took position reports from a number of boats. I was ahead of several class 2 & 3 boats and all of the class 1's who reported. No sign of Bucks Eagle though, or Celtic Dream an X312 who I felt would be another likely challenger in class 1.
Kept up a pace of 6-7k through the day and following night with the NW breeze between 10 and 20k.

Leg 1 Day 3
Wind backed very slowly towards W and I continued the same pace. No contact with any other yachts in the fleet although I occasionally saw another sail (who was not answering on Ch.16). Saw a pair of small dolphins very briefly.

Leg 1 Day 4
I awoke from an overlong sleep with bells ringing in my ears: wind shift alarm, radar detector alarm, battery low alarm, weather forecast alarm! A cargo ship is about a mile away, no danger of collision. Nav. lights off, start the engine to charge batteries, where am I going? I am heading SSE, my course when I went to sleep was SW, I must have slept through several wind shift alarms (the autopilot was sailing to a wind angle). Tack the boat, now I am heading to cross the ships course. Called them up on the radio and asked them to hold their course, I would tack again if necessary. It wasn't and I crossed behind them.
The wind increased as a warm front approached. When I started getting headed, I tacked again onto starboard as it was now a better course. In the tack a shackle, which secures the lower mainsheet block to the traveller, burst causing several minutes of frantic activity until the mainsail could be brought under control and a replacement shackle installed.
During the evening the wind eased.