The Sirdeshpande family is plenty thankful for ibuprofen.

The pain reliever came in handy last month after Madhuri Sirdeshpande injured her head while taking her son, Gaurav, to a test to qualify for the Intelligencer Journal Spelling Bee.

And "ibuprofen" was the word the eighth-grader spelled correctly to win the 50th annual bee, held Friday at Conestoga Valley Middle School.

Gaurav, who attends Centerville Middle School, outspelled 31 other students from Lancaster County to earn the grand-champion trophy. He'll represent the county May 29 and 30 in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C.

This was Gaurav's third try at winning the Intell Bee — and it almost didn't happen.

On Feb. 20, Gaurav's father, Gourish, was driving Gaurav, Madhuri and his daughter, Divya, from their East Hempfield home to CV Middle School, where Gaurav was to take the qualifying test.

The roads were slick, Madhuri recalled, and another vehicle was "totally out of control" and sliding toward the Sirdeshpandes' car.

When Gourish swerved to avoid a collision, the family's car struck an embankment and flipped onto its roof.

"I came out of the car bleeding, and I said, 'Oh my, how can we get (Gaurav) to the test?' " Madhuri said. "That was the first thought on my mind."

A friend happened to be passing by and offered to help. She called another friend, who whisked the uninjured Gaurav to CV while an ambulance took the other family members to the hospital.

While they were being examined in the emergency room, Gaurav was acing the qualifying test.

Madhuri and Gourish sustained minor bruises and cuts, and their daughter was uninjured.

Gaurav, who finished fifth in the 2007 bee, said he was "confident, but not overconfident" Friday night.

By the seventh round, he and three other spellers were left: home-schooled student Amy Gormley, Megan Strait of Manheim Central Middle School and Megan Goldfarb of Landisville Middle School.

Amy misspelled "escarole," Megan Strait missed "ephedrine" and Megan Goldfarb misspelled "brontophobia."

Gaurav had only to spell "croustade" — a crisp shell in which to serve food — correctly to win the bee. Despite having studied spelling bee words for two hours a night for weeks, he couldn't recall having seen the word before.

He "took a shot at it," Gaurav recalled, but missed, spelling the word as "crustade."

"When I didn't get it, I was like, 'OK, I still have a shot at it,' " he said.

His misspelling meant all four contestants were back in the running, but Amy missed "terraqueous" (consisting of land and water) and Megan Goldfarb misspelled "avifauna" (the kinds of birds of a region or period).

In the next round, Gaurav correctly spelled "clavichord" (an early keyboard instrument), and Megan Strait dropped out after misspelling "riparian" (of or relating to the bank of a river or stream).

Pronouncer Richard Kerper told Gaurav, "If you spell this word correctly, you are the grand champion."

"I go up to the microphone, and I was like, 'I hope I get an easy word,' " Gaurav recalled. "(Kerper) said 'ibuprofen,' and I was like, 'Oh, yes!' "

When Kerper announced the word, the audience responded with an "Awwww!" Apparently, they, too, were amazed at how easy the word was — given the difficult words that preceded it.

Gaurav stepped up to the microphone, and, without hesitating, spelled "ibuprofen" correctly.

He's never used the pain medicine, but his mother took Motrin, which is the commercial name for ibuprofen, after the crash.

"It's amazing that we have made it here today," Madhuri said after the bee. "It's very special, and it's a great honor for him."

The grand-champion prize includes free travel to and from Washington, D.C., plus free food and lodging while there, for Gaurav and a parent from May 26 to 31.

E-mail: bwallace@lnpnews.com