

In the meantime, the green team prepares for the competition. They don't emphasize a healthy lifestyle with a balance of good diet, exercise, the right amount of sleep and the right amount of practice. These swimmers like to party! They stay up late, eat what they want, and think of swimming as just one more thing they do. Some of the team members don't actually like to swim, but do it because they're told they must. Their coach relates every conversation about swimming to the competition, pressuring them to do well. So how do they succeed?

Back at the blue team, the coaches also know about the vitamin. They have carefully examined the vitamin to know what is in there to help their swimmers. During each practice, they carefully infuse powdered samples of these vitamins, giving each team member the right dosage of the amount of the part of the vitamin that each one needs to build skill. The three swimmers who are having the most difficulty are given larger doses, but still swim just as much every day, even more than some of their teammates.

The green team celebrates their victory. The swimmers go off for their break, saying they'll see each other the following year, happy they don't have to take that vitamin any more, and staying away from recreational swimming because of it.
The blue team is slightly upset because they didn't win, but the scores show that they were just a little short. The swimmers go off on their break too, but they go off to swim some more, because they've learned to love it. They continue to live a healthy lifestyle filled with diet and exercise and good sleep habits, because it's who they've become.

All things being equal, if both teams just use the vitamin approach, then the competition really would just be a measure of who came to the team more naturally prepared to win anyway. The blue coaches are certain that the approach they've used historically doesn't always give them 1st place, but gives swimmers the ability to navigate any swimming situation, even the competition, sometimes.
