World Beard Championships

The United States is the world's new facial hair super power. Go on, tell me you already knew that, and see if I believe you. But according to this site, it's not only true, but the US only entered the competition in 2003 and is already leading the world. Well, I guess there are worse kinds of world domination.

Now stop laughing, because this is important. Large sums of money may change hands, not to mention the threat to the reputations of some of the finest and hairiest countries in the world. Germany, especially, is unimpressed by losing its previous position of ascendancy to the Americans, and you don't want to mess with the Germans.

Sadly there are no celebrities to be seen here. I was hoping for ZZ Topp.

My only complaint is that the site isn't keeping up to date at the time of writing, so that the results of the European Beard and Moustache Championships, held last week, are not yet in. The USA was competing with a team of four "beardsmen", and Germany was hoping to pip them at the post, if only by a hair.

[EDIT: The results are in, with the Europeans sweeping the board. Official photos are here: http://www.bcostbayern.de/leogang_2010.html (German)]

I can, however, bring you the results of the 2010 National US Beard and Moustache Championships, which starred beardsmen from California who grabbed first place in the Full Beard, Partial Beard and Moustache categories. However, it was the German Champion Willi Chevalier who walked away with the Freestyle competition and also achieved Best In Show for his quite remarkable facial hairiness.

If you're interested in pursuing the sport yourself, you should also check out the Facial Hair Handbook, written by red-bearded champion and pogonologist, Jack Passion, whose web site is at http://facialhairhandbook.com.