The annual Scripps National Spelling Bee ended again in a tie this year. Indian-Americans Gokul Venkatachalam, 14, and Vanya Shivashankar, 13, emerged as co-champions in the recently concluded spelling contest after correctly spelling "nunatak" and "scherenschnitte" respectively.
After three nerve-wracking days, Gokul and Vanya beat the other 283 spellers and became the last two standing at the popular spelling contest. The judges told Gokul that if he got the next word correctly, they would declare him and Vanya co-champions. This was because they were running out of words in the competition's list to keep the two young contestants competing.
For the second year in a row, two contestants tied for the spelling bee grand champion title. In 2014, Ansun Sujoe and Sriram Hathwar emerged as joint winners.
The third spot at this year's contest went to another Indian-American, Cole Shafer-Ray, who hails from Oklahoma.
This year is the eighth successive year that Indian-Americans won the prestigious competition. Among the 49 finalists this year, 25 among them were Indian-Americans. From the final 10, seven among them were Indian-Americans.
In 2009, it was Vanya's older sister, Kavya, who won the championship.
Like most other contestants, Gokul and Vanya had also been competing in the spelling bee before. Gokul won 10th place and 19th place when he competed in 2012 and 2013 respectively. Vanya appeared in 2010, 2012 (tied for 10th), 2013 (tied for 5th) and 2014 (tied for 13th).
Gokul said that the way he handles spelling is similar to how his idol LeBron James handles basketball. He is also a fan of alternative and rap music and likes listening to the music of Macklemore, Linkin Park and Nas. He also likes to read and admits that Life of Pi is his favorite reading material. He is also a fan of the movie X-Men: Days of Future Past.
Vanya, meanwhile, is dedicating her victory to her grandmother who passed away in October 2014.
"This is a dream come true. I have wanted this for such a long time," said Vanya.
Apart from spelling, Vanya is also into acting and playing the tuba and the piano. Only recently, she won the Mid-America Music Association award for the titles "Jazz Pianist" and "Exceptional Pianist."
Both Gokul and Vanya are bringing home a gigantic trophy from the contest and receiving a cash prize of $35,000.
