(Yet another) early start with a bus ride down to Puerto del Carmen to do one lap of the sea swim course - the marker buoys aren't out yet so I missed the main turn but still managed a slow & steady 40 mins. That time may well change on Saturday with 1,499 other racers in fighting for the same bit of sea! It's easy to get distracted from your stroke too as you see loads of fish on the way around.

Then is was back on the bikes for a 40k climb up to Timanfya again. And once more I was shocked by the wind. I know I've said it before but it's just so strong, even pushing against it going downhill is tough.

Added a cross-bar bag to my bike today as I realised I need 14 gels and a couple of power bars. So now my lovely lightweight carbon bike is weighed down with gels, food, two 750 mil drinks bottles, two inner tubes and a small multi-tool (you can wait up to 30 minutes for bike techs to get to you in the mountains).

I also bought 24 400mg Ibuprofen - I'll drop one an hour before the end of the bike and (probably) one per hour on the run.

As well as stuffing myself silly with pasta / potatoes / rice / veg / fruit / choc croissants and the like, I'm getting through 500g of electrolyte powder, 500g of carb powder every three days and a two to three gels. All of which I'm not used to so my system is having to adapt fast. Electrolytes are particularly important here - the heat and humidity suck the strength out of you and it makes sense to try and sip all day long as well as take two full bottles on every ride and keep one around for swim and run sessions.

Sleep is suffering a bit too, but on chatting to others here I realise I'm not alone. I grab an hour between training sessions if I can and try to go to bed early(ish) but find it difficult to get to sleep. I wake at about 4am/5am thirsty too so have taken to taking a bike bottle to bed. I'm then awake at about 6:30am and can't get back to sleep.

But that aside, I'm having a great time here - very tired but also pretty strong now and am as ready as I'll ever be for the trial ahead.

Another lap of the swim course tomorrow and another 40k bike session - then a race nutrition talk early evening followed by a team dinner.

Roll on Saturday :)