We were at Zanesville over the weekend. Mrs. R worked as a steward, I judged. Had a fun time. Saw many that we knew, met some new people, will see many at the NHC in GR.
It is a well run competition, Big Frank does a great job as organizer, Bill and the rest of the team work hard, and they had the envelopes stuffed with score sheets by the time for pizza and the raffle. Good job.
I had 4 in, and while none were under 30, none advanced. Two went to mini-BOS, but did not advance. Both of those were scored at 40.5, so there were even better beers on the table. Not the first time we have struck out, but there is always next year. Just have to brew a little better next year.
On the plus side, Saturday before NHC Mrs. R will be in GR to sort bottles at the 2nd round drop of site, as she is head Steward. Now I can pitch in and help, as I have no conflicts of interest with beers in the second round.
Shhhhhhhh… Quit telling everyone how well the KC site is run - now it is going to fill up right away next year
I did pick that site for three reasons though this year-
1.) I knew it did not fill up right away last year, and figured if there were too many entries, it might be a good first choice.
2.) It was an early regional, and I figured I would know my results sooner and it would work out better with the age of the beers I was sending.
3.)Positive experiences with other comps run by the same people.
All of those thoughts ended up working out as I had anticipated.
In fairness, it was actually kind of a hard choice - I am about the same distance from Milwaukee, KC and St. Paul - all 3 of those groups consistently run great competitions. Also, Drunk Monk is a well run comp. and I assume that is the same people that are doing the Chicago site. I sent to St. Paul last year and had no complaints. I don’t have personal experience further east or west for the most part, but, I do think all of the midwest locations are very well-staffed and well-run.
Well done Jeff. I got a 32 on a Flanders that isn’t quite done yet, but it still managed a 32, despite being young and FLAT! I tried those Prime Dose tablets and they didn’t work quickly enough to carb up the samples I sent, despite being warmed for two weeks at 74F with a digital heat wrap before being sent. The positive side is I can let the few other bottled ones take more time to carb and see how they are. I got great feedback and that was all I hoped for. On a Helles I got a 38 which didn’t advance, but I’m happy with that score as it was overcarbed and thus had a carbonic bite…again great feedback from KC. Thanks judges, stewards and comp site organizers!!!
naturally my little-too-roasty schwarzbier that medaled last year was the one that didn’t qualify this year. I guess everyone else stepped up their game. 8)
I judged in San Diego over the weekend. A couple of thoughts and observations;
I judged IPA and American Ales
About 90 IPA’s were judged, About 20 advanced to a mini-BOS.
About 60 American Ales were judged, 15-18 advanced to mini-BOS
This is the first time I used the “Checklist” Scoresheets. I like them. At first I was hesitant, but I think they are effective. Talking to other judges, they had the same sentiment.
If you want to have better odds on advancing to the 2nd round, brew lagers, ciders, and meads. Most of them had less than 10 entries per category. I believe the Pilsner category only had 5 entries.
Quaff and the local organizers run a great 1st round. They get a lot of judges. For the IPA category, they had 22 judges and most if not all were BJCP certified. I don’t think any judges judged more than 10 beers per flight.
I don’t know how many Pilsners were at Zanesville, but the had at least 2 judge pairs for category 2. I entered 3 lagers, but that didn’t really help. I brew a lot of lagers, as those are what we like in the summer on the deck. I like the ones we entered a lot, but the judges didn’t.
Will me first round entries per category per site be posted?
…man, 90 IPAs. that’s a lot of disappointed brewers of great beer.
I would be the first to admit I focused on categories with less insane competition levels. 2x Dark lager, 2x Cider.
I just looked at the judge assignment which have the entry counts per category. These were the low count.
Cat 1: 11 entries
Cat 2: 5 entries
Cat 3: 8 entries
Cat 4: 10 entries
Cat 7: 12 entries
Cat 27: 5 entries
Car 28: 6 entries
Cat 24: 5 entries
I’m curious how the other regions have their entries broken down by category. I’ve been wondering with the 4 beers per entrant if this has changed the type beers people are entering.
Still waiting for NYC regional scoresheets, but the beer I sent, a California Common scored a 37.5 at the Ocean State Homebrew Competition this past weekend in RI and placed 2nd via mini-BOS! So fingers crossed!
Cat 26 - 3 in KC, all high enough to advance.
Cat 24 - 5 in KC, all 35 or higher.
cider categories each had 6-7 and I believe 8 melomels showed up in KC.
Too bad - I’d like to see more ciders/meads entered.
I judged 11 Pilsners and I believe there were 11 Dark Lagers, 12 Amber Lagers and low teens Light Lagers.
There are fewer of us lager brewers but there’s a bunch of really skilled people making them. I suspect the same goes for mead/cider but even more pronounced. So it’s not poor competition but there’s no worry of getting lost in a cloud of hops at one table or dominated by 40 imperial stouts at another.
good luck to everyone that advanced and those that haven’t been judged yet.
Also judged in San Diego and agree with your comments. They do a great job running it, I think this was my 4th or 5th year and it gets better each time.
I had Strong Ale and there were 24 entries for 8 judges, 9 made the mini-bos and were all very good of course. So although I’m confident we got it right it was challenging and took some discussion and give and take to get there. A very enjoyable mini-bos session with the other two excellent judges.
One of the hard things about the mini-bos format is to see a beer not medal when you think it might have been one that you scored >40 on a score sheet. I purposely try to NOT to remember the entry numbers of the ones we send along so I can (hopefully) be more objective, so most of the time I have no clue or I’m just not sure.
18 in Zanesville vs 5 in San Diego. Well we know what San Diego is famous for. Might be interesting to see all regions categories in a spread sheet. Where are more lagers brewed, where do the make more ciders and meads.
My first guess is that ciders will be more popular in apple growing states, but what do I know?
I didnt judge the categories but I think cider entries were pretty low in Seattle.
We had 1 flight of light lagers (12 or 13 entries) and 2 flights of pilsners. It was nice to be able to judge those, I never get to because I always enter those cats (sent mine to Sacramento this year)
Not everybody enters in the closest region. Our club sent our entries to Zanesville, rather than to the South region. So mine was one of the 18 pilsners there. I hope to get the score sheets soon.
