New Judging Format
Mark Tumarkin
Last Thursday, seven of us gathered at my house to judge the Am Wheat monthly style contest entries. This was the first time we have done the judging away from the regular monthly meeting. I think it was a successful experiment. We had six entries. This is more than we usually get, though I have to confess to throwing a ringer into the mix. In addition to entering my Am Wheat, I also entered the Monster Mash Saaz beer that took 2nd place as a wheat in the Sunshine Challenge.
It must be a good wheat; our judging panel gave it 2nd place as well. This brings up some interesting issues as far as choosing style categories in competitions, but we'll talk about that later. However, George Perrin's winning entry got a better score than the ringer.... Yours really was a wheat beer, wasn't it, George?
The results were:
First Place - George Perrin
Second Place - a tie between Bob Bates and Wayne Smith
As a result of this contest, we now have a new point leader in the race for Homebrewer of the Year. Congratulations, Wayne! But then, it's not over yet, we're not quite at the halfway point.
I think this was a successful format change for the contest judging. First of all, it gave us another occasion to get together and drink beer. That in itself is a good thing. The judges didn't miss all the presentations and fun of the general meeting. Plus we had a better, less distracting judging environment. We also had a large panel of judges, including both novices and BJCP judges. This gave more club members a chance to learn about the formal judging process, and to gain a little experience in judging. This is truly valuable, both for the novice judges and also for the club in general. We'll try it a time or two more before making it a permanent change, but I think it's a better format.
Hope to see more of you at next month's judging session. It was a lot of fun.