Call them hot and unbothered. During late June’s heat wave, when most New Yorkers sat pinned to air conditioners, 1,200 sauna enthusiasts swarmed Brooklyn’s Bathhouse to witness the country’s first sauna master smackdown. Some wore bell-shaped felt bucket caps to prevent overheating and to signal: This ain’t my first hydro-deo . Others were Bathhouse regulars who, like any good New Yorker, saw a line — in this case for the wellness venue’s 80-seater “event sauna” — and joine

Aufguss: a world championship for twirling a really hot towel. On the hottest day in New York City in a decade, nearly a hundred people crowded into a hundred-and-seventy-degree sauna in a converted brewery in Williamsburg for the first U.S. National Aufguss Competition. An Aufguss—from the German word for “infusion”—is a ritual sauna ceremony that lasts for twelve to fifteen minutes. A sauna master fills the room with carefully curated scents by dropping snowballs containing

America’s first Aufguss champions set to represent Team USA at the Aufguss World Masters in Verona, Italy NEW YORK, NY, UNITED STATES, July 1, 2025 / EINPresswire.com/ –– The heat was intense—but so was the enjoyment—as the first-ever Aufguss USA Nationals wrapped up last week at Bathhouse in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Over two unforgettable days, guests packed the purpose-built event sauna to witness something unlike anything seen in the USA before: a high-energy, scent-filled