competition advice

[Pat Campagnola]

Your first tournament should be just for fun. No expectations. Just a fun learning experience. After that you should then begin to work on a gameplan for competing that will evolve as your skill and knowledge evolves.

Solid advice. As others have said, dealing with the adrenaline and nerves could be an issue, especially if you have no previous combat sport experience. I was completely overwhelmed by the adrenaline and nerves at my first competition and basically froze and felt exhausted in 30 seconds, even though my cardio was on point.

I have not lost the nervous feelings, but keep working on ways to prepare to handle them and focus into something positive. You won't know until you go out and do it though. Don't put any expectations on yourself yet and just go out and do jiu jitsu and have fun. That's why most of us are here, right?