So the 2012 National Spelling Bee has come and gone. I can't say that things turned out 100% as I would have liked. But I have very little room to complain, and after all is said and done, I'm immensely proud of Frank. Porwigle will haunt him to his dying day, but the sting of getting the one word he didn't know in the final rounds will slowly but surely fade. He performed tremendously, and definitely was a major contender. And hey...7th place in the nation? The highest placing first-timer from the US? Repeated accolades from Samir Patel (one amazing 5-timer from the mid 2000s) and Nupur Lala (1999 champion)? Nothing to bat an eye at.
I was so caught up in rooting for Frank that the winner, Snigda Nandipati, barely registered as a blip on my screen, so to speak. Especially after such killer rounds 5 and 9, everything else was, relatively speaking, nothing.
In the past, I've gone back and forth on whether Dr. Bailly's more jocular sentences were appropriate, but now that I've seen them in person, in an incredibly tense ballroom, I'm convinced that they really are appropriate...necessary, even. They are a great way to defuse some of the tension, and I'm grateful for them, actually. Even if a poor speller misses their word after hearing a funny sentence, the effort has at least been made to try and mitigate the sting of the bee.
And speaking of defusing tension with humor, this kid deserves a special award...and his place in bee lore is now secure.
The journey to the national bee was amazing, and the bee itself was agonizing, and perhaps not my favorite of all time, but still great. I'm happy to have been a part of it. I'm also very happy that studying is done and over with for now...it took a lot of time and preparation on my end. I'm taking at least a month off, and when I do start, it will begin at a slow, 2-hour pace, just like last year.
Yes, this is a short post. Hungry for more commentary from the point of view of a coach? Check the post I wrote for another excellent blog.
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