Cigar news:
Keep smoking
Slow and steady
On June 15 at the Cigar Smoking World Championship (CSWC) qualification tournament in Bucharest, Romania, Darren Cioffi, owner and founder of Brentwood-based Principle Cigars, set the new world record with a smoking time of 3 hours, 24 minutes and 27 seconds.
Oleg Pedan of St. Petersburg, Russia, held the previous record with a time of 3 hours, 14 minutes and 36 seconds.
The CSWC annually hosts 35 qualifying tournaments in countries around the world. The world championship tournament is held in Split, Croatia, each September.
Cioffi entered his very first CSWC competition in 2014. That year he set a new world record and became the first American to win the world championship.
“Prior to my involvement with the CSWC, it was dominated mainly by Russian competitors,” Cioffi said.
Cioffi set new world records five times from 2014 to 2016. He then retired from competing to focus more on Principle Cigars and to help promote and expand the CSWC.
“At the competition in Bucharest, I really just felt like smoking a cigar, so I decided to compete at the last minute. Needless to say, I was very happy to top the record by 10 minutes and probably as shocked as everyone else, especially after not having done this for a year,” Cioffi said.
Cioffi is passionate about cigars. As he travels, he said he could enter a cigar lounge anywhere in the world and immediately have common ground with the other patrons.
In 2014 he launched the Nashville Boutique Spirits and Cigar Festival, an annual event held in May to promote craft spirits and premium small-batch cigars.
Principle Cigars are available at local cigar shops including Primings Cigar Lounge as well at bars/restaurants such as Acme/The Southernaire, Redneck Riviera, Craft Brewed, Alley Taps, The Moose and more.
For more information about Principal Cigars, visit www.principlecigars.com.