I used to debate in high school, which provided a lot good story material. There was one in particular that has more lasting humor than all the rest. My brother recently had to write a narrative essay and decided to retell my experience with this one particular tournament.
The only background I’ll give out is that debate tournament are usually massive affairs where hundreds of people from different schools are competing all at once. Just keep that in mind.
Oh. You should also know this is a true story (the story, not the speech), and the trophy was enormous.
Here’s my Kevin’s essay – republished without his consent – but hey, you’re getting credit Kev!
“How I Won It”
Reclining coolly in a chair at the awards ceremony Jonathan thought back about the tournament that he had just won. His mind meandered through the most thrilling parts. His wandering mind dreamt up a speech. A speech he might say if they decided his award merited a speech. What would he say in this victory speech he pondered in his mind? He’d probably explain how he had won this tournament. Yes, that would be a wonderful speech.
It would start like this. “Hello everybody, my name is Jonathan Lowery, through hard work and extreme determination I won this tournament. For the benefit of other debaters I shall give a short explanation of how I triumphed over everyone else in this debate tournament.” That was a very catchy beginning to a speech. He smiled to himself as he dreamt up the explanation of his shocking victory “I was one of many participates who entered this tournament hoping to take away the big trophy. I fought my way through four matches in the preliminaries. My tireless efforts earned me a spot in the quarterfinals.” The preliminaries had been the hardest thing to win in the entire tournament, but he knew for sure that it was in the preliminaries that he had done his best debating.
“Through my hard work and ardent arguments in the preliminaries the officials decided to give me a bye for the quarterfinals. I went straight to the semifinals.” Shear luck Jonathan thought. That’s what got him through the quarterfinals without debating. “Once I reached the semifinals my prodigious reputation gave me the edge over my opponent. That edge combined with hard work earned me a spot in the finals.” Mr. Dulaney had almost had a stroke over the semifinals. Mr. Dulaney was enraged when he discovered it was against the rules to debate someone form your own school. He vehemently debated with the officials for ages over that rule. He wanted his students to debate for a spot in the finals. Eventually, Mr. Dulaney gave up and chose Jonathan for some arbitrary reason.
“Having so effectively progressed through the preceding rounds. My opponent became faint of heart and could not face me. All I had to do was wait for his argument to fall apart.” The other finalist had simply been unable to attend since he was taking the ACT the morning of the finals. So he had progressed through three rounds of debates sitting on bench in an empty cafeteria.
The speech was so ridiculous Jonathan didn’t bother to think up a conclusion. In the end he was glad that he was not required to give a speech for his award. Though, his imaginary speech would probably be a hit at parties especially if people knew the real story. That was where his speech belonged, in party. At that party he would tell people of his amazing triumph. How he had won a tournament through loopholes and dumb luck, yet, he thought, as he received his enormous trophy that would be a funny story speech to write down sometime. It would have a catchy title like “How I Won It.”