GABF Judging: Checking in from CO
Matt spent last week in Colorado, lending his talents as a judge for the Great American Beer Festival, the largest (9k+ entries) and most prestigious beer competition in the U.S. It's Matt's 17th year as a judge at GABF, which definitely makes him one of the veterans (old guys lol).
You may be wondering how on earth a competition can sort through 9,000 entries in any sort of objective fashion, so we'll fill you in a little: The first step is that all those entries fit into about 90 different categories, each of which awards a medal for the top three beers of that style (think Hazy IPA, Pilsner, barrel-aged stout, etc.) Quick math says each category ends up with about 100 entries (although the largest ones like IPA are more like 400), which is still way too many for one person (or group) to sort through and pick the best.
So what happens is that within each category, beers are divided into manageable flights of 10 or so, going through rounds of sports-bracket-style elimination. A group of judges will taste the 10 beers in the flight and pick the top 3 beers that fit that category (a hazy IPA will be eliminated from the American IPA category, no matter how good it tastes). Those top beers then get moved onto the next round where they'll be judged against the top beers from another flight that was judged by another group of judges. That elimination and reduction happens for usually 2-3 rounds before reaching a final verdict of the top beers in the category and the best beers of that style in the U.S.
All beers are judged by multiple judges and are served double blind to ensure objectivity - there are different people who pour the beers, who deliver the beers to the table, and then finally who judge the beers and you’re not allowed to judge a category that your beer is in. It's a huge undertaking that goes on for about 3 weeks before winners are announced at the end of the month during the consumer-facing festival. It's crazy hard to win something (<3% of beers medal), but fingers crossed we can continue in our success.