Buzz surrounding El Paso 8th grader heading to Scripps National Spelling Bee

EL PASO, Texas -- Topgallant, that's the word that crowned Marium Zahra the El Paso Regional Spelling Bee Champion back earlier this month. She's will now represent the Borderland on a national level for the second year in a row.

The Young Women's STEAM Preparatory Academy student beat out 20 other students from across the region to take the title and is hoping to beat out hundreds more at the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington D.C. Zahra is the reigning champion of the National Spanish Spelling Bee.

Zahra said she's been competing in spelling bees since the fourth grade.

"I love competition," Zahra said. "The spelling bee was just like another addition to that. I got to control whether I won, or I lost. If I lost, it's not because of anyone else, it was because of my mistake."

She told ABC-7 she has been studying since October 15,000 words a day with the goal of learning up to 100,000 words.

Her father, Munazzam Ali Mahar, said he's extremely proud of his daughter and that helping her study has become a family effort.

"Before I saw her preparing, I was thinking that it's only English (words)," Mahar said. "There's a lot of Latin word and French, German, even Sanskrit, Hindi, and Arabic words....So it's fun to work with her.

"Obviously, to win would be amazing," Zahra said "I feel like the most important thing is to learn something out of after the spelling bee.. so just try my best because if I don't win, I'll be happy. But if I win, I'll be ecstatic. It's just important that I don't stress too much, but try my best.

The Scripps National Spelling Bee takes place in June.