Sah, who hoped a strong showing in the competition might somehow reunite his family, was eliminated today, tripped up on a written test.

"All that I studied for this. I don't know. It's just really depressing," Sah said in an interview.

Nearly two-thirds of the competitors were eliminated in the preliminary rounds, including two others from Utah - Helene Ma of Kaysville and Erika Gritton of Provo.

All three Utah spellers correctly spelled their only oral word they were given - Ma correctly spelled "physician," while Gritton nailed "burly," but it was the written test, featuring stumpers like takt, syssarcosis and Bewusstseinslage, that sent them all home early.

In the oral round, Sah got the word "hurdle," not the most difficult word considering other contestants got words like mastodon, reproducible and resemblance. But it couldn't have been more fitting for the 13-year-old who had already overcome so many hurdles.

Sah lives in Green River with his uncle, D.C. Prasad, who runs the Ramada Inn hotel Sah's parents built before they were forced to return to India last summer after his father's visa expired and they lost a protracted fight for asylum.

Sah had hoped that he could capture the national title and attract enough attention to his parent's case that they somehow would be permitted to return to the United States. The burden of competing for the fate of his family proved too much.

"My mind was diverted," he says. "I was thinking about my mom and dad's case mostly."

Kunal's father, Kanhai Lal Sah, came to the United States in 1990 and applied for asylum after his visa lapsed, fearing the tension between Muslims and Hindus in his hometown could put his family in danger.

But Sah had been part of a Hindu group that had persecuted Muslims, the judge determined, making him ineligible for asylum. The ruling was appealed but upheld, eventually by the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Sen. Orrin Hatch was able to delay Sah's parents' return to India by a year, but they left the United States last year.

When the results were announced, Sah said, "I started breaking down."

"I just cried for at least a few hours," he said. "What will happen now? My uncle consoled me. He said this isn't the end. This is just the beginning of your life."

Wednesday evening, his uncle took him to see "Spider-Man 3" to try to help take his mind off the disappointment, but Sah said he couldn't really enjoy the diversion.

This was Sah's last shot at the spelling bee. While there are older contestants, he is a grade ahead in school and will be starting high school next year, making him ineligible. Sah said now he will focus on getting into Harvard, where he hopes to study medicine or business.

"It is what it is," said Sah. "Life goes on. I can't just depend on spelling."