Stimson Middle School student Natalia Lutz got as far as the third round of the Scripps National Spelling Bee on Wednesday before she stumbled.
She misspelled the word “miserly” after spelling “Kazan” correctly in the second round.
Natalia had made it to the prestigious, highly competitive match by previously spelling correctly such words as Vorlage, democracy, haversack, hepatitis, vegetati, the spelling bee said.
ESPN ,which shows the later rounds of the bee, put up some fun facts about words and what trips up the young spellers most often.
The competition is being held in Oxon, Md.
Scripps said 519 spellers qualified for the Bee.
How to watch Thursday’s finals and other details.