It's official: Ten-year-old Nate Lang is Bermuda's best speller.

The Somersfield Academy student stormed to victory in Saturday night's final of Bermuda SpellDown ¿ a night of tension, triumph and even a few tears.

Nate, from Southampton, won a family cruise for four to Disneyworld, a laptop computer and a $100 Phoenix Stores certificate after beating off competition from 22 others from the Island's public and private schools.

He beat eight other finalists from regional "ZoneDowns" on Saturday at Mount Saint Agnes school auditorium. Appearing calm and confident throughout as he stood in the bright spotlight on stage, Nate breezed through the early rounds nailing the tricky spellings of 'treacherous', 'sufficient', 'bouquet', 'riboflavin' and 'sumptuous'.

Those were just some of the 350-plus words he and his co-competitors spent months learning and being drilled on by parents and teachers.

Next he was challenged with unfamiliar words, and successfully negotiated 'detention' and 'precaution' before being caught out by 'mannequin'. But that didn't spell the end for young Nate, as the only other competitor left by this time, ten-year-old Jordan Bascome from West End Primary, also stumbled over the tough word.

That meant both of them got to try again with another one ¿ 'exasperate' ¿ which Nate got right. Jordan then stumbled over 'distinguished' with Nate getting it right, and jumping for joy as it won him the competition.

Speaking as he was mobbed by his classmates afterwards, Nate admitted: "I just can't believe that I'm the winner! I was nervous after I spelled 'mannequin' wrong. I thought 'oh no, this is all gonna end'. I'm really happy to have won a cruise ¿ I've never been on one before."

Nate has a sister, Hannah, aged eight, and lists his hobbies as golf, tennis, running and baseball. His favourite subject at school is maths, and he wants to be a meteorologist when he grows up.

He was cheered on by his mother, Sara Lang, and father Peter Lang. Mrs. Lang admitted she was gripped by the tension of finals night in the competition which was organised by Bermuda College and partly sponsored by this newspaper.

"My palms were sweating and I was really nervous but he looked so confident and I knew he could do it. He's a better speller than me," she said.

Minister of Education Randolph Horton was on hand to console the runners-up and hand out their prizes ¿ the book Pages in Time:100 Years from The Royal Gazette, a certificate and pen set.

First runner up Jordan won a laptop, i-Pod Nano and a laser jet printer for her school. Second runner up Michael Gonzalez from Warwick Academy won an an i-Pod Nano, a $100 Phoenix gift certificate and a new colour printer for his school. In addition to his personal prizes, Nate also won a hi-tech printer and fax machine for Somersfield Academy.

Mr. Horton said of the competition: "It's a very valuable exercise for young people to go through. The competition is important as is the time spent studying. It was great and I think all the kids did well."