In mathematics, a sexy prime is a prime number which differs by six from another prime number. Bear with me.

For example, 7 and 13 are sexy primes - they are both prime numbers and they differ by 6.

If adding six to the second number also creates a prime number, then you have a sexy prime triplet. 7, 13 and 19 are sexy prime triplets.

If adding six to that third number produces another prime, then you have a sexy prime qaudruplet, and so on.

If your brain hasn't melted by now, then you can read all about sexy primes on Wikipedia.

The reason I mention it is that the Son of Dawn To Dusk entries have been published. I am in a sexy prime - number 269. Which is also a sexy prime triple and a sexy prime quadruplet. Somebody's trying to tell me something.

Perhaps they're trying to tell me that the sexy little AJP PR3 is a prime candidate for getting me round the course. Or perhaps they're trying to tell me that they need to overcompensate the sexiness of my race number to make up for the fact that I am genetically ugly and could easily play Shrek's stunt double. No discussions with Hollywood about this yet - but when "Shrek Does 2009 Dakar" is getting made, I'll audition for the part.

Some familiar names on the entry list. There's Jago (who's not got a sexy number) and there's Gary Taylor (the BMW instructor who got up on his pegs at 95mph on the M4 all those blogs ago). Then, obviously, there's Zippy who we can rely on to be giving it 'andful all the way round.

We can also rely on Zippy to have some comic words of wisdom about the little PR3 - stuff like "want a dummy for the end of your Camelbak hose?" and "why did you bring the Wee Yin's bike - is yours broken?". All delivered with a mischievous grin that an imp would die to have.

Maybe I'll even get to take him on the back of my bike - repay the favour he did me in the dunes in Morocco.

Some of the team names are absolute comic genuis. There's "Slow and Slower", "The Halfwits", "Larf Muppets", "More Speed Grommet!" and "Too Old For This". More like It's a Knockout than enduro, but such is the great atmosphere and the great people who take part.

My own team name - "Seemed Such a Good Idea At The Time" - speaks for itself. Both in terms of the name itself, and in terms of entering the event.

When I see the names on the entry list (some of whom I recognise from the enduro events) and I think of the standard of their riding then I do start to get a little bit scared - and I have no problem admitting this. There is nothing wrong with fear - it's a perfectly normal emotion and it is there to protect you.

Being brave isn't the same thing as not being afraid. Not being afraid is, in some situations, the same as being an idiot. Being brave is all about being afraid, but doing the very thing that you are afraid of.

An Olympic swimmer competing in a 500m swim race is not brave. A person with a horrific fear of water doing a single width of a swimming pool is brave. You get the point.

I've never pretended to be anything other than shit scared by the speed and terrain and bikes flying everywhere on an enduro. All I can do is try to overcome the fear and race the race anyway, the best that I can.

In some ways, I wish I was doing the race on a huge KTM or BMW. Then I'd have a nice convenient excuse for not finishing. The bike was too heavy. It was too big / fast orange / blue / fat / smelly / noisy (delete as appropriate). But I have no such excuse. I have the lightest 4-stroke enduro bike in the world, race prepared by Martin at AJP, and I have an identical spare bike in the van just in case.

There is no excuse, no backtracking. The only thing I can do is turn up at the start line and wait for the flag to drop. When it does, I will shit myself.

And there's only one thing to do when you're shitting yourself - "give it 'andful".

Download the Manic Mission Information Pack for the full story ...