SOUTHAMPTON, England - Bermuda entry Team Tyco led the Volvo Ocean round-the-world race yesterday as the eight yachts headed towards the equator after crews battled with light winds and long swells.

Tyco, skippered by two-time round-the-world winner Kevin Shoebridge of New Zealand, led illbruck and Amer Sports One in the Bay of Biscay off France. The race began on Sunday off Cowes, on the Isle of Wight.

The early lack of wind has frustrated the sailors, but a new southwest breeze helped the boats sail at around eight knots.

"The last 24 hours have been very frustrating with the wind ranging between two and five knots and the direction all over the place," said Ian Moore, co-navigator on illbruck. "Now it seems that we all found the wind at the same time."

The German boat is skippered by US Olympic sailing silver medallist and America's Cup veteran John Kostecki.

Tyco, based in Bermuda but run from Boca Raton, Florida., was 11 miles to the west of illbruck, which split from the fleet on Monday, but returned yesterday.

On Amer Sports Two, the all-female crew was busy trying to determine the damage done to its spinnaker, which ripped in two shortly after the start.

"If we can't make it into something useful we will keep it and when we get to shore, we will lay it out in a sail loft and repair it as you would any other sail," said watch leader Katie Pettibone. "It will be back in play for the next leg."

The boats are expected to arrive at Cape Town, South Africa on October 23, after the longest leg of the nine stage race. Unlike the last race, then called the Whitbread, each of the nine legs counts for the same amount.

The other legs will take the fleet to Sydney, Australia; Auckland, New Zealand; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; Miami, then Baltimore in the United States; La Rochelle, France; Gothenburg, Sweden, before finishing at Kiel, Germany in June, 2002.