JERSEYMAN Phil Sharp is still cutting a swathe through the Mini Transat fleet.

Last night he was sixth, up three places since Tuesday.

And a week ago he was 58th after a gamble on his course soon after leaving Lanzarote failed to bear fruit.

But Sharp, in his Le Gallais 419 single-handed boat, is now less than 77 miles behind leader and first leg winner Douguet Corentin with the fleet past the halfway point on the 3,000-plus mile race to Salvador, Brazil.

Said Sharp’s cousin Anna Stevens this morning: ‘He’s been doing incredible things – he must be asking things of his boat and himself like never before! ‘Most of the websites reporting on the Transat have been running the story of Phil’s astonishing rise from 58th place – one reckons it’s possibly the biggest climb in the race’s history.’ The fleet are now approaching the end of the Doldrums and should enjoy the south-easterly trade winds of the Southern Atlantic for the rest of the race to Brazil.

Unexpectedly the Doldrums have done little to slow the front runners with some covering around 160 miles a day.

Corentin has regained the lead from Yves Le Blevec, but the leaders haven’t managed to form a breakaway group as they did in the first leg from La Rochelle to the Canary Islands: there are less than 100 miles between the lead boat and tenth place.