Thomas Raich Wins Regional CSWC Germany

Germany didn’t settle with just one Cigar Smoking World Championship qualifier this year. In addition to the national one in Düsseldorf in the beginning of July, where reigning world champion Hauke Walter secured his third title in a row, there was a regional setup in at the G C Gentelmenˋs Club in Eisenbach for south, east and central Germany. Despite the geographical span, the organizers were happily surprised by the participation as some of the competitors came from as far away as Luxembourg, Hamburg and Magdeburg.

The day of the competition started with a rum and cigar tasting held by none other than one of the international judges of the CSWC, Thomas Geißler, who’s a sommelier and cigar sommelier as well, took the opportunity to explain the rules one last time before the race was on.

After the first hour, there were two fighters left. President and co-founder of the G C Gentlemen’s Club, Kevin Clemen, went head to head with Thomas Raich from Würzburg. Both of them suffered penalty minutes for either losing ash within the first 40 minutes or burning the ring. Raich suffered the most, having to deduct 16 minutes from his actual smoking time. Although miles away from Hauke Walter’s massive almost three and a half hour performance in Düsseldorf, it was still enough to secure victory. 1 hour 24 minutes and 35 seconds was about 16 minutes better than Clemen’s time, while Christian Schwarzkopf from Magdeburg claimed third place with 51 minutes and 18 seconds.

As a last treat, one of the participants, Mike Neubauer, who had traveled all the way from Hamburg, presented a new brand on the market. All the visitors got to try his Stauffenberg torpedo, made in Honduras, while listening to his story about the path from idea to the cigar.

1. Thomas Raich 1:24:35
2. Kevin Clemen 1:08:29
3. Christian Schwarzkopf 51:18