Bearded & Tschorn: In final 2009 WBMC tally, Alaska edges California by a hair

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I’ve finally had a chance to crunch the numbers -- I would have posted the results earlier but there was some confusion in a few categories (mostly last name first/first name last stuff) that seems to have been cleared up. (To clear the air on another point; the Los Angeles Times’ style is to spell ‘mustache’ without the ‘o,’ but since the title of the championship -- and the categories -- spell it that way, when we refer to them, we will defer to the contests’ spelling.)

In the final ‘medal’ count -- actually trophies shaped like gold pans -- from a field of 292 competitors, 10 Americans won 11 first-place awards (Alaskan David Traver picked up his second one in the Overall Champion category), there were eight second-place American competitors and 10 third-place prizes for a total of 29 pieces of hardware.

German competitors took five first-place prizes, seven second-place awards and five more third-place wins for a total of 17 spots on the winners’ podium, followed by a single first-place finish each by beardsmen from the Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom (which also added a pair of second-place finishes to its tally).

Belgium (which fielded only seven competitors) took home one second-place finish and a pair of third-place wins. Italy took home a single second-place prize, and Canada a single third-place finish.

State-wise, the home team scored five first-place finishes, narrowly outstripping the Golden State by a single trophy -- not too shabby considering one of the wins was for the Alaskan Whaler strip beard -- which plays a whole lot better on the Kenai Peninsula than it does in California.

Here are the full results:

Moustache Division (46 competitors)

Natural Moustache
Kees Lek, Netherlands
Keith Jefferson, United Kingdom
Ben Davidson, USA

English Moustache
Lutz Giese, Germany
George Haskins, USA
Sam Holcombe, USA

Dali Moustache
Tony Papai, Germany
Max Klaus Pankow, Germany
Robert Starnes, USA

Imperial Moustache (as noted earlier, all three winners hail from Los Angeles)
Benjamin Juergens, USA
Patrick Melcher, USA
Alexander Antebi, USA

Hungarian Moustache
Nicholas Dighiera, USA
Guenter Rosin, Germany
Josef Ibach, Germany

Moustache Freestyle
Keith Haubrich, USA
Devon Holcombe, USA
Luc Vanderbeuren, Belgium

Partial Beard Division (102 competitors)

Natural Goatee
Paul Beisser, USA
Breman Grove, USA
Wolfgang Servay, Germany

Fu Manchu (aspiring ‘stache-thletes take note: there were only two competitors in this category)
Ted Sedman, United Kingdom
Detleff Steinhoefel, Germany

Musketeer
Juergen Draheim, Germany
Frazer Coppin, United Kingdom
Reinhard Burker, Germany

Partial Beard, Imperial
Karl-Heinz Hille, Germany
Udo Fritzsche, Germany
Mark Voermans, Belgium

Sideburns/Muttonchops
Toot Joslin, USA
Bruno Panza, Italy
Bill Mitchell, USA

Alaskan Whaler (all three winners were from Alaska)
Jerem Feltman, USA
Aaron Suring, USA
Shawn Campbell, USA

Partial Beard Freestyle
Stuart Wilf, USA
Roland van Den Bremt, Belgium
John Plummer, USA

Full Beard Division (144 competitors)

Verdi
Karl Roos, Switzerland
Markus Bross, Germany
David Caswell, USA

Garibaldi
Douglas Renfro, USA
Norman Pendergraft, USA
John Price, USA

Natural Full Beard
Jack Passion, USA
Craig Lundvall, USA
Alois Plettl, Germany

Natural Full Beard w/styled moustache
Bernd Popiak, Germany
Bob Gengler, USA
Kyle McNair, Canada

Natural Beard Freestyle
David Traver, USA
Gerhard Knapp, Germany
Hans-Peter Weis, Germany

Overall World Champions (chosen from among the winners of each category)
David Traver, USA
Karl-Heinz Hille, Germany
Jack Passion, USA

-- Adam Tschorn

Illustration by (and courtesy of) Jason Nitti and Neel Williams.