Ted Botha

For competitively challenged people, winning really isn't everything (honest).

This sobering truth struck me as I was floating on my stomach in the middle of Long Island Sound. Behind me lay a mile of open water and the tiny island from which 50 of us swimmers had set out about a half-hour earlier. I'm not really sure whether it was a half-hour exactly - maybe it was 29 minutes, or maybe 31 minutes and 50 seconds - because I didn't bother to check my watch at the halfway mark. Someone who wanted to set a good pace, break a record - a winner, that is - would have.

My friend John is that kind of driven person. At the last buoy, he stopped long enough to check his time. "Twenty-eight minutes, thirty-six seconds," he told me afterward. On the return swim, he managed to knock more than four minutes off his time. There was a triumphant, winning ring to his voice when he told me the news.

John was in a competitive mood from the moment he picked me up that morning. He was sure he had a good chance of winning the race or, at least, of finishing first in his age group. His only concern was Dana. If Dana had improved since last year, John wasn't so sure of his own chances.

I didn't pay much attention to John's talk of winning until we reached Greenwich. Waiting for the ferry that would take us to the starting point, however, I noticed the air was charged with similar conversation. Even people who weren't taking part in the swim were guessing who'd take the trophy. (All this for just a small, badly publicized two-miler in Connecticut.) And if the topic of conversation wasn't winning, then it was about beating someone. One man of about 60 said he was wearing a wetsuit not because of the cold water but because, with the extra buoyancy, he was sure to beat his strongest opponent. Another swimmer said that, as a first-timer in the race, I could be a 'ringer,' an unknown who might actually be good.

Until that moment I hadn't thought about winning or beating anyone. Honest. I seldom do. In fact, I seldom even think of these endurance events as races to be won or lost. When I mention to friends afterward that I just swam a couple of miles with a hundred other people, or that I completed a triathlon, they say, "You mean you were in a race?" and I answer, "Well, um, I guess."

My attitude's all wrong, you might say, seeing that a race, by definition, is meant to be won. And maybe you're right. But that's the way it is with some of us. We don't think in terms of winning, but simply about taking part. We don't have that dark, lean look about us. We don't train with stopwatches. And we don't shave our legs. It's never even crossed our minds that we have to do better.

At least that's the way I thought until Greenwich. Suddenly I was infected by the talk of winning. I thought, "Hey, maybe I am a ringer. I do have a chance of crossing the finish line first." Never mind that I knew nothing about the competition, that I hadn't trained hard enough, and that my legs, unlike theirs, had never seen a bottle of Nair. I was momentarily consumed. All I could think was "Win! Win! Win!"

When the gun went off, I tore into the early-morning water with a vengeance. I overtook one swimmer after another, including the 60-year-old dressed in black. (So much for buoyancy, I snickered winningly.) In between swells, I could see lots of orange caps (men) and yellow ones (women) in front of me, but there were even more of them behind me. I felt confident.

Somewhere between buoys four and five, though, my mind, if not my body, started wandering off course. My mind has a tendency to do this during races, which, I suspect, might have something to do with why I never win. Instead of the race, I began thinking about other things: what I'd eaten for breakfast, how much water I'd swallowed so far, whether there were sharks in Long Island Sound. I also thought about death. When you're swimming across a huge stretch of dark, choppy, bottomless water, where it'd be easy to drown and disappear without a trace, it's hard not to think about death.

I don't know how long I was lost in contemplation, but suddenly an orange cap swam up alongside me. That's when I realized that I'd allowed my mind to stray from the goal of winning. I looked for the orange and yellow dots in front of me - the ones I'd meant to chase - but they'd reached the horizon. By letting my mind think about something else besides winning - even if it was about a subject as profound as death - I'd lost.

In a way, I was slightly relieved. The possibility of winning had made me feel responsible, as if I owed something to the people waiting at the finish line. Now freed of all obligations, I could swim at the pace I was used to.

At least that's what I thought. But having just acquired the competitive spirit, I wouldn't be getting off the hook that easily, I realized; the gods on Trophy Heaven weren't done with me yet. If I couldn't win, maybe I could as least beat someone. And, right on cue, that beatable person materialized out of the swells like a yellow-capped mermaid.

Instead of ignoring her - and thus entering a second round of loserdom - I took up the challenge: I raced her. For the next mile we swam neck-and-neck. She passed me, then I passed her, and we played tag like this until it was time for the last dash to the beach.

My hopes were rising again. Maybe I wasn't a loser after all. "Concentrate," I told myself. "Stay cool-headed and determined. That's what swimmers do. Save your thoughts of death for after you cross the finish line."

When Yellow Cap and I sprinted the last 100 yards and raced up the beach, however, it was she, not I, who kept cool. My mind didn't stray this time; it just got carried away. I got so flustered with the thought of beating someone that I swam to the wrong exit point. She beat me by 10 seconds.

Later that morning, while my friend, along with everyone else (even the 60-year-old), was collecting trophies, all us losers stood by, drowning them with applause. It was then that I had to ask myself the obvious question: What was the point of taking part in these races if I never win?

The answer dawned on me later, after I'd stopped feeling sorry for myself: Losers are necessary ingredients in any competition. Who else is there to beat? If it weren't for us, there'd be no race for the winners to win. Losers make it all possible. With this renewed sense of purpose, I'll be out there again next season - even if it is, once again, to come in near to the back.