I just signed up and paid for my first mountain bike race. It's not until April but my nervousness is already there in the back of my brain. My goal is to finish.... that's it. Nothing major. Since I paid for it and I'm a broke graduate student, I absolutely have to show up on the starting line. That's why I've already paid! I've been mountain biking for many years but have never competed. I'd been in competitive sports my whole life and had wanted to do something just for me. But the last year or so I've had that itch to compete so I forked out the dough. We'll see what happens. I'm not really telling many people because I don't want anyone except my partner to show up to watch. Silly, I know. But it's all part of my nervousness about finishing. We'll see what happens.