It took 21 grueling rounds and three hours, but in the end Bethel Park eighth-grader Kyle Barron was firmly in place as the winner of the 59th Annual Western Pennsylvania Spelling Bee.

His winning word: ensconce.

The 13-year-old from Independence Middle School spelled that word (to place snugly or securely) and inexorable (that cannot be influenced by persuasion or entreaty) to take the title after battling Pine-Richland seventh-grader Lauren Brown for five rounds at the end. Lauren tripped up on urceole, a Latin word for the water vessel used in a Roman Catholic Mass.

The pair each missed words such as pellucid (transparent), solecism (ungrammatical words in a sentence), florulent (relating to flowers) and opprobrious (expressing contempt) before Kyle came away with the win, which includes an all-expenses paid trip to the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee May 26 through 28 in Washington, D.C.

"I had trouble with the 'schwa' sounds," said Kyle, who came in fourth in last year's bee before besting 108 schoolchildren from grades four through eight yesterday in the Frick Fine Arts Building at the University of Pittsburgh.

Western Pennsylvania has some good spellers. There were 30 schoolchildren left at the end of the morning semifinals and 15 still left after eight rounds in the finals, when spelling bee officials turned to more difficult words to cut down on the field.

One of the final spellers was crowd favorite Evan Smith, 10. The tiny homeschooled boy from Avalon could not touch the ground with his feet when sitting and could barely reach the microphone when spelling. But he still made it through the 12th round, ending up in sixth place.

Other finalists included: eighth-grader Tommy McCoy of Marshall Middle School in the North Allegheny School District, third place; eighth-grader (and last year's winner) Jeremy Pople of Mellon Middle School in the Mt. Lebanon School District, fourth place; and Joseph Olivas, a homeschooled sixth-grader from Clarion, Clarion County, fifth place.

Their losing words, in order, were trapunto (a decorative quilted design), mitriform (shaped like a bishop's headdress) and frigorific (cooling).

The bee is sponsored by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Carnegie Science Center.

Kyle's parents are Bruce and Nancy Barron. Like last year's winner, Kyle said he practiced spelling rather briefly in the weeks leading up to the bee, putting in about 30 minutes of study daily. He said he spends more time swimming, doing that for more than an hour a day, five days a week.

He has also trained fifth- and sixth-grade spellers in the Bethel Park school district.

The first-prize winner also receives a trophy, $100 savings bond, Webster's Third New International Dictionary, Steelers 75th Anniversary medallion collection and a one-year subscription to Encyclopedia Britannica online.