Toronto Beer Week Homebrew Contest

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Thu Sep 08, 2011 8:53 am

A final reminder that the deadline for entries is 9pm Friday night. If there are any questions, just drop me a PM. Best of luck to those who have entered - we'll aim to get first round results posted middle of next week, and the prizing and final round results will be posted during Toronto Beer Week.

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Fri Sep 09, 2011 11:24 pm

Hi guys,

The deadline has come and gone. Last year we had 95 entries, and I believe that this year we have become the biggest contest in Canada with 244!

For those who did not get my spiel in person. Judging will take place over the next few days, and we will announce category winners by the end of the week. If you've won a category, you've won a prize. Prize order will be allocated by Ontario's finest brewers during TBW itself. All entries will receive feedback, and I'm a slow typer, so expect it from mid September to early October.

Good luck everyone!

Rob

Hamilton Brian · Post by **Hamilton Brian** » Sat Sep 10, 2011 1:19 pm

That sounds amazing Rob. Good luck to all the judges; it seems like an enormous feat!

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Tue Sep 13, 2011 9:47 pm

21 categories have been judged, with only two remaining to be done in the next couple of days. The standard has been extremely high this year, and even those who don't medal should be proud of themselves. Results will be announced on the TBW website, bartowel and via email in the next few days. Gold medal winners get a prize and advance to round two on September 24th (that's where you'll find out what you won). Silver and bronze winners sadly cannot advance, but should be very pleased with themselves, as every category had great depth and quality. All winning entries are kept refrigerated until the final judging round. Good luck!

Bonesey · Post by **Bonesey** » Wed Sep 14, 2011 9:27 am

Hi Rob, could you clarify a few things? Will silver and bronze winners receive prizes? What is being determined in the 2nd round? Presumably gold medal winners are tops in one of the 25 categories. Is the 2nd rnd to determine Best in Show? Thanks

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Wed Sep 14, 2011 9:34 am

Bonesey wrote:Hi Rob, could you clarify a few things? Will silver and bronze winners receive prizes? What is being determined in the 2nd round? Presumably gold medal winners are tops in one of the 25 categories. Is the 2nd rnd to determine Best in Show? Thanks

Hi.

Silver and bronze winners will not receive prizing, but will have the ride of knowing they placed well in the competition. We would do prizes for them, but considering there is no entry fee there isn't really the money to do an additional 46 prizes.

All gold medal winners have won a prize - the second round determines what that prize is and who is best on show. Essentially, it will rank all the gold medal winners from best to 23rd best.

grub · Post by **grub** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 10:38 am

have those last two categories been judged yet? excited to see the results!

matt7215 · Post by **matt7215** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 11:34 am

grub wrote:have those last two categories been judged yet? excited to see the results!

me too!

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 2:10 pm

Last two categories will be judged on Sunday. We have all but two of our winners already, but I think it's only fair to wait until the roster is complete!

markaberrant · Post by **markaberrant** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 3:46 pm

Bobsy wrote:The deadline has come and gone. Last year we had 95 entries, and I believe that this year we have become the biggest contest in Canada with 244!

Congrats on the increase in numbers!

We had 353 entries in Regina this year, and Calgary was just over 270, while Vancouver and Edmonton were right around 300 each.

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 6:32 pm

markaberrant wrote:
Bobsy wrote:The deadline has come and gone. Last year we had 95 entries, and I believe that this year we have become the biggest contest in Canada with 244!
Congrats on the increase in numbers!

We had 353 entries in Regina this year, and Calgary was just over 270, while Vancouver and Edmonton were right around 300 each.

Jeepers, that's a lot! What do you think drives such large numbers? Bigger homebrew community? Different prizing? More established?

matt7215 · Post by **matt7215** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 7:46 pm

hey rob, could you post the 25 catagories that were judged?
just the breakdown of what styles got put into what catagories would be great.

Bobsy · Post by **Bobsy** » Thu Sep 15, 2011 10:44 pm

Hi guys,

These were the categories judged. We're just waiting for English Pale Ales and Scottish / Irish Ales. No results until then. All categories were based off BJCP groupings - a few were merged if we had too few entries to judge a category, and a few were split where it made sense (e.g. we had 10 black IPAs in the specialty category so we figure it deserved it's own award).

Amber Hybrid
American Amber / Brown
APA
Belgian Specialty
Belgian Strong
Belgian Wits and Pales
Black IPA (split off from 23-specialty)
English Pale Ale
Fruit Beer
German Wheat and Rye
IPA/IIPA
Lager
Light Hybrid
Mead, Braggot, Cider and Perry
Milds, Stouts and Porters
Saison
Scottish and Irish Ales
Smoked / Rauchbier
Sour Ale
Specialty
Spiced / Herbed / Vegetable
Strong Ale
Strong Specialty (split off from 23-specialty)
Wood-Aged Beer

This year's entries were phenomenal, and as a homebrewer I feel humbled. Every winner should be immensely prude - there wasn'y a single soft category in the bunch.

markaberrant · Post by **markaberrant** » Fri Sep 16, 2011 12:54 am

Bobsy wrote:Jeepers, that's a lot! What do you think drives such large numbers? Bigger homebrew community? Different prizing? More established?

Regina and Edmonton both have strong clubs that have been around a long time. Based on my experience as an entrant, these 2 comps have the most qualified and knowledgable judges of anywhere in Canada by a long, long shot (that isn't to say they are all perfect...). Calgary is developing a decent pool of judges, but most other comps are still lacking in this regard. It takes a lot of training and experience to become a decent judge, we all have to learn somehow, it just takes time.

Calgary and Vancouver are relatively new clubs, but have dived in head first; they meet regularly, have a ton of members, and have begun investing in BJCP training and certification.

Regina has always had the most/best prizes (AND we have always shipped them to the out of town winners... some comps still don't do this). However, most other comps have picked up their socks, and TBW now seems to be tops by a wide margin.

Regina is also a first round qualifier for the National Homebrew Competition in the US, which is the largest homebrew comp in the world (7000 total entries last year). It is great and all to win at any old competition, but if you really want to see how you stack up against the big boys, you enter the NHC.

Also, the Reg, Edm, Cgy and Van comps are part of the Canadian Brewer of the Year circuit. You pretty much have to enter all of them if you want a shot at winning. Even the Lethbridge comp got 120 entries this year, mostly because they were a CBoY comp.

So yeah, what makes a good comp? It comes down to judges, prizes, and organization skills (a good tipoff is a decent website with a good online entry system... make it as easy as possible to enter and manage).

Just about everyone across Canada is running better and better comps with more and more entries, and the quality of judging and prize packages are also improving. It is an exciting time to be a competitive homebrewer in Canada!

Tapsucker · Post by **Tapsucker** » Fri Sep 16, 2011 11:25 am

Bobsy wrote:
Every winner should be immensely prude

Some of us are just immensely modest.