The 15th anniversary of the Cigar Smoking World Championship delivered on many levels. A new venue in a new city at a fantastic location, a record-breaking amount of participating countries and people during the season following up to the grand finale in Dubrovnik, and two historic achievements by the same person.
\n\u201cHauke Walter was simply the most focused,\u201d CSWC founder Marko Bili\u0107 says. \u201cThat\u2019s what he\u2019s famous for.\u201d<\/p>\n
All eyes were on last year\u2019s world champion when the CSWC debuted at the Rixos Hotel in Dubrovnik, on the last weekend of August. Hauke \u201cThe Iceman\u201d Walter was the clear favorite. He had the two best times of the year, unless you count Oleg Pedan\u2019s winning time in Belarus without the 15-minute penalty he received, and he\u2019s been very confident in his slow smoking.
\nThis is all good, but a final is always a final, and this year the CSWC organization made a decision which would further shake things up.
\n\u201cThe grand finale is very hard to organize,\u201d Bili\u0107 continues. \u201cIt\u2019s like tennis. You never know how many sets they will play, so we decided to see what happened if we provided a competition cigar which was more on the dry side.\u201d
\nInstead of 69 percent\u2019s humidity, the cigars were kept, unbeknownst to the competitors, at 65 percent. They found out quickly, though.
\n\u201cMany people damaged their cigars when they cut it, including me,\u201d Walter says. \u201cThe wrapper behind the ring was completely damaged, but it was still very good in front of the cigar so I kept it.\u201d
\nAs the competitors tried to adapt to the lower humidity, top contenders dropped out one by one.
\n\u201cThe Italian champion, Marian Nedela, and the British one, Etan Patel, were out early,\u201d visitor and former Italian champion Gino Iannillo, says. \u201cBut Hauke once again showed how cool he can be.\u201d
\nThe Swedish and American champion, Igor Kova\u010di\u0107 and Drew Emch, were also among those who struggled.
\n\u201cDrew was one of the leaders for a long time, but when he started having problems he had to pull a bit more,\u201d Bili\u0107 says. \u201cIgor\u2019s cigar was doing heavy tunneling, so one part of the cigar was completely unburned, and it was very hard for him to fix it.\u201d
\nWith every puff the cigar burns more the dryer it is, but even though the was shorter than earlier years, the excitement was more present than ever.
\nAfter the 2022 world champion, Borys Szkodzik, was out at 2 hours 49 minutes and 17 seconds, only two competitors remained; Walter, who had about half a centimeter left to the ring, and last year\u2019s second runner-up Anastasya Arsenova, who was already smoking under the ring.
\n\u201cI\u2019ve never seen Hauke\u2019s hands shake before,\u201d Bili\u0107 laughs. \u201cAnastasya\u2019s too, and all around them there were people cheering.
\n\u201cThe situation around the final three competitors has never been as crowded as this year,\u201d Dino Tomic, head of marketing at the CSWC, adds. \u201cAlmost all the 220 people present surrounded them and cheered them on.\u201d
\n\u201cUnder that pressure I don\u2019t think Anastasya was able to keep the focus necessary, so she burnt the ring,\u201d Bili\u0107 continues\u201d
\nWalter, on the other hand, kept his cool.
\n\u201cEven when Marko in the last five minutes kept shouting \u201cHauke is out, Hauke is out\u201d, Walter just looked at him and took a small puff,\u201d Iannillo laughs. \u201cThe Iceman!\u201d
\n\u201cSince it was more difficult than earlier years, I took my glasses off at the end, to do my own thing,\u201d Walter says. \u201cYou don\u2019t want to focus more on others than yourself, but every now and then, when Marko shouted \u2018she\u2019s out\u2019 or \u2018he\u2019s having problems\u2019, I\u2019d put them on and take a quick look.\u201d
\nWhen Arsenova received her 15-minute penalty the game was over. Not wanting to risk anything, Walter let his cigar burn out, thereby becoming the first person ever to not just defend a world champion, but also win three of them.
\n\u201cBefore the competition started I told myself that this is a chance to become unique,\u201d Walter continues. \u201cSo it was fantastic.\u201d
\nJust like last year, the final was live streamed, this time with moving cameras and all, and Bili\u0107 is happy with the result.
\n\u201cAgain people were following the final from cigar lounges around the world, cheering on their countrymen like they were watching the Champion\u2019s League or something.\u201d
\nHe\u2019s also happy with the move to Dubrovnik.
\n\u201cThe location was stunning and the Rixos hotel was very cigar-friendly. There were even people not there for the CSWC who asked me where the final will be held next year, so they can come and watch.\u201d
\nThat is still to be disclosed, though.
\n\u201cAll the fantastic feedback pushes us to go out of our comfort zone,\u201d Bili\u0107 concludes. \u201cThe people at Rixos Hotel want us back, and we want to come back, but who knows? Maybe we even move the final outside of Croatia?\u201d<\/p>\n
The 15th anniversary of the Cigar Smoking World Championship delivered on many levels.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":68708,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[49,63,44],"tags":[5366],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68707"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68707"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68707\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":68710,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68707\/revisions\/68710"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cigarjournal.com\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}