For 13-year-old word whiz Vincent Bautista, the traditional Mexican soup represented a final hurdle, six letters, three of them vowels, separating him from cementing a family legacy at Madison’s All-City Spelling Bee on Saturday morning.
It wasn’t until Bautista sealed his victory with the final “o” that the white-knuckled crowd exhaled. Bautista could only smile: The weight of the competition had lifted, replaced by the weight of a massive golden trophy, where his name will be engraved alongside every other spelling bee champion dating back to 1968, including his own brother and sister.
“On that last word, I really didn’t know it, so I had to do my best on it,” he said. “My heartbeat was pumping.”