“I mean, I’m only in fifth grade!” It’s not where you want to be, but hey, I can’t spell these words either, so I’m not going to fault the kids for it. Both times, Nihar followed up with his own flub. Whittled down again to 10 final finalists for the Scripps National Spelling Bee. “He’s one of my best spelling friends”. The two winners will each receive $45,000 cash and prizes.
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While his fellow contestants opted for the dab, Janga threw up the “X” in homage to his hero, receiver Dez Bryant after he correctly spelled “gesellschaft”.
When he was asked to spell “taoiseach” (a word I can barely spell even now, the next morning after several times seeing it) his response was “oh, like the prime minister of Ireland?”
While some would be disappointed to share the spotlight, these two were rooting for each other, according to the Democrat & Chronicle.
Nihar Janga, 11, of Austin, Texas, center, and Jairam Hathwar, 13, of Painted Post, N.Y., right, approach their siblings as they rush the stage to celebrate with their brothers after the two were named co-champions in the 2016 National Spelling Bee, in National Harbor, Md., on Thursday, May 26, 2016.
The other words the two got right included Kjeldahl, Hohenzollern, juamave, groenedael, zindiq and euchologion. He looked unbeatable. But given two chances to hold the trophy by himself, he stumbled. After back-to-back years of co-champs, the Bee changed the rules to make it more hard to produce co-champs.
The 11-year-old nailed it to secure a tie and become the youngest champion since 2002. First, he never expected to win.
It took about a minute for Nicola to start spelling the word and two seconds after she finished came the ring of the bell that told her she would not be continuing on.
“I wanted to win, but at the same time, I felt really bad for Jairam”, he said. The bee has produced Indian-American champions for nine straight years and 14 out of the last 19.
This year, Kumar improved after finishing in 4th place last year.
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Cooper Komatsu, 13, an eighth-grader at Culver City Middle School, placed eighth.
