12-year-old spells “abseil” to win the National Spelling Bee

Bruhat Soma from St. Petersburg, Fla., won the 96th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee on Thursday. He was undefeated throughout the three-day competition. Soma is a seventh-grader at the Turner/Bartels K-8 School.

What is Soma’s reward? He will take home:

• A $50,000 cash prize from the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

• A $2,500 cash prize and reference library from Merriam-Webster.

• $400 worth of reference works along with other resources from Encyclopædia Britannica.

How did Soma win? A total of 245 spellers came to National Harbor, Md., for this year’s competition. In the final round of the competition, Soma spelled 29 out of the 30 words correctly. His competitor spelled 20 out of the 30 words correctly. Soma cemented his win after spelling the word abseil correctly in a tiebreaker match. To abseil means to descend a steep slope using a rope.