La Flor Dominicana Special Football Edition 2024

Every year since 2015, La Flor Dominicana has released a special cigar to commemorate the most popular sporting event in the U.S. Named the Special Football Edition, the annual limited edition is sent exclusively to retailers located in the state where the Super Bowl is taking place—which this year happened to be Nevada—well in advance of the game.

True to its namesake, each of the Special Football Edition cigars is decorated with the outline of a football constructed out of contrasting pieces of tobacco. Since the wrapper for this year’s 6 x 58 toro gordo was an Ecuadorian habano wrapper, Connecticut shade tobacco was used for the accents that make up the football and various stripes wrapped around the top, middle and foot of the cigars. The binder and filler blend is made up of tobacco grown in the Dominican Republic.

Each cigar had an MSRP of $24 and only 500 10-count boxes were released, for a total of 5,000 cigars. The cigars were rolled at the company’s Tabacalera La Flor S.A. factory in the Dominican Republic, and boxes started shipping to retailers in January.

• Cigar Reviewed: La Flor Dominicana Special Football Edition 2024
• Country of Origin: Dominican Republic
• Factory: Tabacalera La Flor S.A.
• Wrapper: Ecuador (Habano & Connecticut)
• Binder: Dominican Republic
• Filler: Dominican Republic
• Length: 6 Inches
• Ring Gauge: 58
• Vitola: Figurado
• MSRP: $24 (Box of 10, $240)
• Release Date: January 2024
• Number of Cigars Released: 500 Boxes of 10 Cigars (5,000 Total Cigars)
• Number of Cigars Smoked For Review: 3

The combination of the large size—albeit lighter than I expected—angle-cut foot and the extremely obvious football shape cut out of lighter tobacco is visually a bit overwhelming. All cigars are covered in medium brown-colored wrappers that are exceedingly dry to the touch, with almost no oil present. In addition, each of the three cigars is nicely firm when squeezed and has at least one protruding vien. Sweet earth leads the aromas emanating from the wrapper, followed by barnyard, black pepper, nuttiness, creamy woodiness and a slight vegetal note. Scents from the feet include creamy peanuts, dark chocolate,  leather tack, nutmeg, coffee beans and generic sweetness. Finally, after straight cuts, the cold draws bring flavors of strong cocoa nibs, milk chocolate sweetness, cedar, peanut shells and salted potato chips.

These are fairly thick cigars, so it is no surprise when it takes a bit longer than normal to get the feet lit properly. The first few puffs after that feature some light spice and a vegetal note, but both quickly recede to the background and are replaced by main flavors of leather tack and peanuts. Secondary notes of cedar, toasted bread, cinnamon, dark chocolate and the aforementioned vegetal note show up at various points, while the retrohale features small amounts of both black pepper and milk chocolate sweetness. Flavor is at medium-plus, and while both the body and strength end the first third at a point just under medium, though I can tell they are not going to stay there for long. In terms of construction, the burn lines on all three cigars are a bit wonky—albeit not problematic enough to need correcting—while the draws are excellent and there is no dearth of dense, gray smoke.

I can feel both the body and strength building as the burn line enters the second third of the Special Football Edition 2024, but the spice that was present on my tongue in the first third has almost totally dissipated. A combination of sourdough bread and gritty earth replaces the leather tack and peanut notes from the first third at the top of the profile, followed by creamy cedar, espresso beans, cocoa nibs, salted peanuts and cinnamon. While I still pick up some black pepper and milk chocolate sweetness, the retrohale continues to be fairly light on flavors for all three cigars. The strength has no issues hitting medium-full by the end of the second third, and while the body increases to medium-plus, the flavor remains at medium-plus. Construction-wise, one of the cigars—the second one I smoked—runs into a minor burn problem that needs correcting to keep it on track, but all other aspects give me no issues.

There is very little change in the flavors during the final third: gritty earth and sourdough bread easily remain on top, with secondary flavors of powdery cocoa nibs, creamy cedar, espresso beans, salted peanuts and cinnamon all showing up at various points. The lack of change extends to the retrohale, as the amount of black pepper and milk chocolate sweetness remains about the same compared to the second third. Flavor ends the cigar where it started—medium-plus—but the body and strength both hit the full mark halfway through the final third and stay there. Finally, the burns, draws and smoke production all work together nicely for all three cigars until their respective ends.

Final Notes

• Super Bowl LVIII took place at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas on Sunday, Feb. 11, 2024. The Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers with a final score of 25-22 in overtime.
• This year’s Super Bowl was the most-watched program in U.S. television history, with an average of more than 123 million people over the duration of the entire game, according to NPR.
• There have been a number of different cigars with a football theme or shaped like actual footballs: Espinosa Cigars released The Big Game Cigars—a store exclusive for Smoke Inn in South Florida —in January 2020 that was made up of a set of four football-shaped cigars designed to be smoked during the four quarters of the game. And, of course, there is the OpusX Football that I reviewed back in 2013.
• The ash on these cigars is extremely flaky—at times, annoyingly flaky—and the burn lines were all over the place, but only one cigar needed a minor correction in the second third.
• With that said, the draws were excellent and all three cigars had a massive amount of smoke coming from their feet at pretty much all times.
• This will be a great cigar to do a Redux review on in a year or so to see if time can tame the strength in the final third.
• The cigars for this review were purchased by halfwheel.
• Final smoking time averaged two hours and nine minutes for all three cigars.