HOW MANY YEARS DID DANIEL STUDY?

Daniel 1:5. And the king appointed them a daily provision of the king's meat, and of the wine which he drank: so nourishing them three years, that at the end thereof they might stand before the king. (KJV) Daniel 1:19-20 And the king communed with them; and among them all was found none like Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah: therefore stood they before the king.  And in all matters of wisdom and understanding, that the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm. Daniel 2:1. And in the second year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar dreamed dreams, wherewith his spirit was troubled, and his sleep brake from him.

Note: The assumption of contradiction is that 1:5 says that Daniel and company can only stand before the king after three years of studying, yet they stand before the king in 1:19-20, and then it is revealed in 2:1 that Nebuchadnezzar was only in his second year of power.  So how could they have completed the three years of training in less than two years? Quite simply, Daniel and his friends showed such promise that they were 'an exception to the rule', and were brought before Nebuchadnezzar before the training was actually done.  Nothing in these verses says that they had actually completed the three years.  Not a contradiction.