International Beer Challenge results revealed

Take 60 people and shut them in a room with more than 700 of the world’s finest beers. It sounds like a recipe for the greatest party ever but this is serious business – judgement day at the International Beer Challenge.

Our guests – a combination of brewers, retailers, importers and informed journalists
– were invited to London to lend their judging expertise to this year’s deliberations. Co-ordinated into 11 tables, our teams were totally focused on the task in hand, despite the obvious allure of the bright sunshine outside. I won’t 
say we didn’t have fun – the IBC is always that
– but we all knew we had a duty and that was
to discover and draw attention to the very best beers on show.

This year, the IBC celebrates its 20th anniversary and the occasion was marked
by entries from around 30 countries. All
the traditionally great beer nations were represented, but so were emerging territories, with strong contingents from Australia, Brazil, France, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand and Spain.

To add to the variety, the sheer diversity of the beers we received was staggering – everything from milds and brown ales to double IPAs, via witbiers, rye beers, bocks, spiced beers, saisons, imperial stouts and wood-aged beers. If you need further evidence that the world of beer is bursting with excitement at the moment, the IBC judging experience delivers in spades.

The IBC rewards entries with medal status, ranging from no medal to bronze, silver and gold, conveying how our judges feel about each beer that passes before their eyes and over their tastebuds.

The procedure is well defined and closely observed. Beers are delivered to the table anonymously and each is evaluated in silence by every judge before a discussion takes place about which medal should be allocated. Faulty beers are ruthlessly exposed but just as much attention is paid to the positive aspects of each sample until a consensus is reached around the table. Unlike other competitions, the IBC doesn’t get hung up on accepted “style guidelines”. Whether a beer is technically correct as a pilsner or an old ale is irrelevant. All that matters is whether it is a good beer – after all that is what most customers will want to know when they are browsing the shelves.

We certainly don’t throw medals around in this competition – more than a third of the beers submitted this year failed to pick up a medal
– so a beer recognised by the IBC is well worth celebrating and the brewers whose beers have collected golds should really take a bow. This year 55 beers achieved gold status, the highest figure we have ever allocated. Among them were entries from big, established concerns such as Samuel Adams, Huyghe and Black Sheep as well as thrusting, vibrant recent start-ups such as Tiny Rebel, Yeastie Boys and Redwell.

We now move on to the final round of judging where we pitch the best against the best. All the gold medallists will be retasted by a reconvened panel of judges to decide which beers will pick up our coveted trophies for the Best Ale, Best Lager, Best Wheat Beer, Best Stout or Porter, Best Flavoured Beer and Best Speciality Beer, and from those trophy winners, the judges will select the overall Supreme Champion. That final round of judging takes place just a couple of hours before the trophy winners are revealed to the world at our grand presentation evening in September. It’s a nail-biting occasion for everyone concerned.

At the IBC, the excitement continues right up to the last minute. 

Here is the full list of winners:

Medal Winners:

Design and Package Medal Winners

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