Australian Amateur Brewing Championship

[drsmurto]

I'll put my hand up and say i agree with Darren.

The most logical scoring system would be one based on the average of every beer you enter in a given competition.

 

[bum]

So a brewer should only brew in a style which they have a proven record? They can't branch out into other styles for feedback? Perhaps brewers who only enter one beer that isn't very good should have points deducted from future entries? Good beers should be penalised for coming from the same shed as a not so good beer?

Makes no sense.

 

[smudge]

I'll put my hand up and say i agree with Darren.

The most logical scoring system would be one based on the average of every beer you enter in a given competition.

I agree (again),

For "best brewer", "Ninkasi", "brewer of the century", "best of Gulgong Show", I agree.

For a single style I think there is no problem with awarding the gong to the beer the judges (whoever they are!)
deem to be the best beer brewed according to the rules of the competition.

Cheers,
smudge

 

[smudge]

So a brewer should only brew in a style which they have a proven record? They can't branch out into other styles for feedback? Perhaps brewers who only enter one beer that isn't very good should have points deducted from future entries? Good beers should be penalised for coming from the same shed as a not so good beer?

Makes no sense.

No bum, you're not listening.

THE question remains. "Why are you entering the competition?"

If your motivation is to get feedback from whatever judging panel happens to judge your comp so that you can improve your
beers, it doesn't matter how many good or bad beers you enter. You'll soon know how the judging panel feels. Branch out to
you heart's content.

If your motivation is to win a medal, best of show, brewer of the century etc, etc, then yeah! Don't "branch out into other
styles" if you can't brew a reasonable beer that comes close to the comp's guidelines.

Cheers,
smudge

 

[bum]

No bum, you're not listening.

Pardon? You seem to be confusing "listening" with "accepting what I say as Gospel".

People's motivations for entering a comp have nothing to do with how the awards should be decided.

 

[Stuster]

I'm writing to the IOC to suggest they adjust their programs to account for countries 'carpet bombing' the Olympics. The overall winning country will be based on the 'Darren method' by the average number of medals per competitors sent. This means that Togo topped the Beijing Olympics after one of their two athletes won a bronze, followed by Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and Kenya. (Australia came a lowly 33rd. <_< ) From here.

 

[Tony]

DrS.

Darren seems to has a problem with the carpet bombing of comps.

The rules from the NSW state comp state:

The only exemption to this is the most sucessfull exibitor for the competition award where all scores will be taken into consideration and enteries must have a minimum of three (3) enteries overall to qualify.

This sounds to me like it meand all enteries are averaged if you have 3 or more enteries and puts you into contention for the award. The more enteries.... the more chance you have of winning.. .even if you have a few really bad beers. Averages work like that.

I personally have always looked apon the MSB award as a bit of a joke and the first in class or brew of show as the big ticket items! Mainly because of this reason in the rules.

Yes i just agreed with Darren :unsure: but im not going to lie or say nothing to stir **** on here........... im sick of all that.

If i have misinturpreted the rule of all the brewers beers scores being averaged..... please corect me..... its just how i percieve the rule.

Its the rule and i accept it as it is......... i never chased it as an award when entering comps for reasons stated above, but its a rule and we live with it.

Bagging out the basis of brewing competioions and there rules (even if we dont like them) sorry Darren.. but especially from yourself as a judge as you have stated with a smile, is not going to fix anything.

I have read over all this a couple times now and i dont think the beef is carpet bombing........ it seemed to be a gripe with aledged state favoritism at state and national comps. Blambing carpet bombing from a few brewers for any gripes you may have with who won..... and as a judge Darren... you should follow the code as other judges do, of all beers will be judged equally and fairly, even if you know the brewer and the beer...... and i dont doubt any judges ability to pick a certain beer from a flight of 10! If we are led to believe judges are using favoritism when judging..... this will onlu destroy the fabric of belief that home brewers hold when entering beers to any comp... large or small.

As a Judge yourself Darren...... isnt this self destructive to work you have put into becoming a judge in the first place..... and im sure that was a lot of work! ???

Cheers

Tony

 

[smudge]

So a brewer should only brew in a style which they have a proven record? They can't branch out into other styles for feedback? Perhaps brewers who only enter one beer that isn't very good should have points deducted from future entries? Good beers should be penalised for coming from the same shed as a not so good beer?

Makes no sense.

bum, sorry I had to quote you again.

Just one question. A hypothetical competition I enter with the aim of winning best brewer of the year. I enter 25 beers. 21 of them are
infected, oxidised, phenolic, cloudy.....you name it, these beers had it.

BUT, I had 4 beers that scored first place and that was enough to give me the honour of "brewer of the century".

Did I deserve the gong of "brewer of the century?" when another brewer only entered three beers and won best of class each time?

Cheers,
smudge

PS
Stuster, sorry but you've just added weight to my argument. That's a letter that should be written.

PPS
Like Tony says, "the more entries, the more chance you have of winning"......Brewer of the Century that is!!

 

[Stuster]

Ok, well to describe a not so theoretical example. Say if you had one brewer who entered ten beers and placed with 5 of them. Another brewer entered one beer and placed with that. Congratulations, the best brewer is our brewer of one beer. :icon_cheers:

I guess I think it's important that people enter beers they are not sure about and would like feedback on. If people only enter beers they are sure are going to do well, everybody learns less. Which to me is more of an issue than who wins the champion brewer.

 

[dr K]

these arguments have gone on for years, and will continue to
the answer is so simple it hardly bears mentioning, so I guess it's analogy time.
Let us then take another competion, pick rugby, or tennis, whatever. rugby players or tennis players paly by the rules or the laws or whatever, they enter the comp as a team or an individual, and always have, knowing those laws or rules or regulations. Those laws, rules, regulations change from time time to time usually by the governing body that governs that sport which suprise usually has a fair mix of retired highly experienced exponents.
The sidelines though are full of characters who "know" the ref got it wrong, the next day work breaks are full of sugsestions and complaints.
If we want to take (and many of us have) amateur brewing to a new and then higher level, then we would be wise to follow the examples of other amateur comps that have shown us the way.
Stay on the sideline, shout all the abuse you can muster, but if you truly want to change things then do something about it, yes, sorry, it does mean getting involved and, hey, communicating on a face to face basis....

K

 

[smudge]

Ok, well to describe a not so theoretical example. Say if you had one brewer who entered ten beers and placed with 5 of them. Another brewer entered one beer and placed with that. Congratulations, the best brewer is our brewer of one beer. :icon_cheers:

I guess I think it's important that people enter beers they are not sure about and would like feedback on. If people only enter beers they are sure are going to do well, everybody learns less. Which to me is more of an issue than who wins the champion brewer.

Stuster,

I know I'm trying to be a bit of an armchair critic here but your example is a good one. If the best brewer's other 5 beers
weren't "tip down the drain stuff", I agree, he/she deserves the gong.

The last paragraph of your post though is the money shot. If you enter a competition to try to win a 'best brewer' award as
your prime motivation.....sorry, you're a bit of a tosser. If you enter to find out how good your beers are in comparison to the
rest and what you could do to make it better, then you are someone I would like to have a drink with!

Cheers,
smudge

 

[schooey]

Some of you blokes are drawing fairly long bows here... If you're honest with yourselves, you have to admit that it would be extremely, extremely rare that 'Tip down the drain stuff' would place in a comp and afford the brewer a chance to move to the next level...

Just sounds like a bunch of sour grapes towards blokes that make the effort to brew and enter numerous beers, and are successful at it IMHO

 

[bum]

Smudge, no need to apologise for bringing up something I've posted again. This is how the internet works and I am comfortable with it.

Stuster basically made my point already. All we're arguing about is numbers, not quality of beer. If this, honestly quite silly, award is to exist the only fair way to award it is to the brewer with the most highly scored beers (even if they throw in a couple duds somewhere). The alternative is having a bloke who puts in 3 class winning beers and one dud losing out to a bloke who puts in 8 beers that don't even place but are consistent. Where a modicum of ability is present the "averaging" method actually increases the likelihood of the carpet bomber winning.

 

[Darren]

Bum,

You enter 8 mediocre beers that dont place, you score nothing. Generally you get three points for a first, two for second and 1 for a third.

My gripe is the scenario where someone enters 12 beers and gets three firsts (total points 9). Although the majority of the remainder of the beers were OK, three of this brewers beers were actual shockers (scoring between 15-30 out of 50)

Another brewer enters 4 beers and gets two firsts one second and the other beer is good (scores 38/50) but does not place (total 8 points)

You tell me which brewer should get the gong as Best Brewer of Show?

cheers

Darren

 

[Maxt]

If you are good enough to get ANY beers to the nats then you did well. To get more than one beer through, means that you are must be a very goode brewer to have come 1st 2nd or 3rd in your state comp. To get multiple beers through means you have mastered many styles, and not just your pet ones. That takes the kind of skill and consistency most brewers can't achieve easily. Think I'm wrong? I challenge you to carpet bomb your state comp next year, and let's see how many make it through to Melbourne.
As Dr K says, the sideline is a very safe place.
Reminds me of the old joke:
Q) How many guitarists does it take to change a lightbulb?
A) 1 to change it, and 10 to stand around saying how they could have changed it quicker, with more feeling, with better tone etc.

Sounds like the above arguments.

 

[bigfridge]

My gripe is the scenario where someone enters 12 beers and gets three firsts (total points 9). Although the majority of the remainder of the beers were OK, three of this brewers beers were actual shockers (scoring between 15-30 out of 50)

Another brewer enters 4 beers and gets two firsts one second and the other beer is good (scores 38/50) but does not place (total 8 points)

Darren,

Once again just as I was about to point out the flaws in your argument - you go and do a better job.

You claim to be an experienced judge but increasingly you show a great ignorance of how beer evaluation and competitions work. Judging is an intrinsically flawed process. The human palate is not an analytical instrument that reports absolute values that can be statistically analysed. But it does a pretty good job (when adequately trained and prepared) of picking up differences and reporting general impressions using a standard language.

This can be clearly shown by the range of scores recorded for a callibration beer. Here the same beer is evaluated by all judges under identical conditions and yet a range of 10-15 points can be reported. What would this do to your 'average' method if one brewer got mainly 'generous' judges while another got a 'hanging' judge ?

 

[AndrewQLD]

Bum,

You enter 8 mediocre beers that dont place, you score nothing. Generally you get three points for a first, two for second and 1 for a third.

My gripe is the scenario where someone enters 12 beers and gets three firsts (total points 9). Although the majority of the remainder of the beers were OK, three of this brewers beers were actual shockers (scoring between 15-30 out of 50)

Another brewer enters 4 beers and gets two firsts one second and the other beer is good (scores 38/50) but does not place (total 8 points)

You tell me which brewer should get the gong as Best Brewer of Show?

cheers

Darren

Darren, maybe you should get the comp your involved in (SABSOSA) to tow your line and change their rules before you try to change all the other competitions, I notice there was a bit of "carpet bombing" as you put it there as well.
Start small, make the changes in your state comp and lead by example, maybe the other states will see it works well and follow suite, or maybe not.

Andrew

 

[haysie]

Darren, maybe you should get the comp your involved in (SABSOSA) to tow your line and change their rules before you try to change all the other competitions, I notice there was a bit of "carpet bombing" as you put it there as well.
Start small, make the changes in your state comp and lead by example, maybe the other states will see it works well and follow suite, or maybe not.

Andrew

Andrew, being so "up" with the goings, Why hang it on SA, look in your own QLD backyard albeit very dismal results. Carpet bombing is alive and well in every state, surely morso the events organisers could do better ( wasnt that the OP?).
Andrew, start small, enter state comps like Victoria`s English Bitter, then improve. Lead by example then hijack it. Food for thought huh

 

[browndog]

Andrew, being so "up" with the goings, Why hang it on SA, look in your own QLD backyard albeit very dismal results. Carpet bombing is alive and well in every state, surely morso the events organisers could do better ( wasnt that the OP?).
Andrew, start small, enter state comps like Victoria`s English Bitter, then improve. Lead by example then hijack it. Food for thought huh

Haysie, there is nobody up here in QLD blaming carpet bombing for our short comings. To be honest, it is a poor excuse say it fatigues the judges pallets and the best beers don't end up getting through, the best beers get though regardless.

cheers

Browndog

 

[Peteoz77]

This is all too hard...

Who has "Carpet Bombed" the local or national competitions?

How did they finish?

Was it worthwhile?

 

[haysie]

Haysie, there is nobody up here in QLD blaming carpet bombing for our short comings. To be honest, it is a poor excuse say it fatigues the judges pallets and the best beers don't end up getting through, the best beers get though regardless.

cheers

Browndog

The best beers get thru? hmmm maybe with a real frown. They dont.
Cant the whole scene be improved a tad too encourage new blood, limit the bombing, champion brewer on ALL points not PLACE points, i.e top tens versus the brewers outside ten`s.
If judges are being presented with the same ole, time after time then surely they call it as they see it, change doesnt shine thru.
The question re. money raised via entries is very valid, why cull entries? I reckon state entries will cull themself after the record breaking misnomer year.
I am a critic of the regime running the show no doubt. Lets keep the thread firing.

 

[The Scientist]

As a judge all I can say is bring on more entries, carpet bomb me and see if I care. I still know a good beer when I taste one and from a whole day of tasting I can always remember the few beers which stood out. No amount of carpet bombing can make up for those few beers which you can be lucky enough to get through your flight which give you that real wow factor.

I'll give constructive feed back to every beer in my flight, even if I don't like it. I take the job of judging very seriously and write comments which I would like to see on my sheets when I enter a beer of my own. I encourage anyone who is interested in improving their beer to enter into a comp (State qualifier or even your local show) and I welcome more entries with open arms as I look forward to the challenge of improving my judging ability with experiance.

At the end of the day there is only the top three which make it through to the Nats but if you get good feedback and a clear direction on how to improve your beer, then that could be you in the place getters with your next attempt. Awards are nice and all but I'm still content with a beer that might not meet any BJCP guidlines but still gives me that smile I can't wipe from my face.

To the health of our obsession and the expansion of the number of brewers into comps. It can onlt lead to better competition and better beer.

Cheers,

TS :icon_cheers:

 

[Gulpa]

Andrew, being so "up" with the goings, Why hang it on SA, look in your own QLD backyard albeit very dismal results. Carpet bombing is alive and well in every state, surely morso the events organisers could do better ( wasnt that the OP?).
Andrew, start small, enter state comps like Victoria`s English Bitter, then improve. Lead by example then hijack it. Food for thought huh

This carpet bombing thing is giving me trouble. Its a bit fuzzy. Exactly how many beers does it take to carpet bomb? Has it been quantified or is it just anybody who enters more beers than me/you.

 

[jayse]

Who wouldn't want so many beers? I envy brewers with all these beers and beer styles to enter and all I have is a couple pale ales in a keg.

 

[samhighley]

This carpet bombing thing is giving me trouble. Its a bit fuzzy. Exactly how many beers does it take to carpet bomb? Has it been quantified or is it just anybody who enters more beers than me/you.

I would say that if you're entering a beer in every category, then you're approaching carpet bombing territory. Some brewers enter more like two beers in every category. That is definitely carpet bombing.

I don't have any problem with it. I just wish I had that much time to brew.

 

[floppinab]

Generally you get three points for a first, two for second and 1 for a third.

Throwing another spanner in the works I hate this. Getting 3 points for a 1st. 2 for a second and 1 for a third is saying the beer that got first is twice as good as that which got 2nd (twice as many points) and 3 times as good as the one that got third (three times as many points). I doubt that anyone could argue that the beers would be that much better.

I would much rather see the points scored for each of the top 3 beers in a class from the same brewer get added together to determine the individual award, a much better representation of the quality of the beers from that brewer than a 3,2,1 which we see used a lot around the place for awards but is a very poor way of determining the winner given the extra weighting applied.

 

[dgilks]

Throwing another spanner in the works I hate this. Getting 3 points for a 1st. 2 for a second and 1 for a third is saying the beer that got first is twice as good as that which got 2nd (twice as many points) and 3 times as good as the one that got third (three times as many points). I doubt that anyone could argue that the beers would be that much better.

I would much rather see the points scored for each of the top 3 beers in a class from the same brewer get added together to determine the individual award, a much better representation of the quality of the beers from that brewer than a 3,2,1 which we see used a lot around the place for awards but is a very poor way of determining the winner given the extra weighting applied.

The problem with this is that different panels of judges will score differently. Using your model, a brewer who places in 3 high scoring categories will do better than a brewer who places in 3 low scoring categories. This means that the MSB would be affected significantly by the quirks of individual judging panels.

 

[Ross]

I'm not saying anything needs to be fixed at a National level, but at our club level where we have some pretty serious prizes for champion brewer (trips to USA brewing), we are using the following criteria for selecting champion brewer.

1) All entrants are restricted to max 6 entries - Stops carpet bombing, makes you think about which beers to enter & gives us maxium entry numbers that we can plan for.
2) Only your 4 best placed beers (points: 3 for 1st, 2 for 2nd, 1 for third) across 4 different catergorys count towards Champion Brewer - Encourages brewers to brew different styles especially where there may be fewer entries & also allows brewers that don't have the time to brew dozens of brews for comp time to have an equal chance, as they only need to brew 4 beers.

The above also helps with judging, as their are still plenty of catergorys left for participating judges to judge without juding their own.


Cheers Ross

 

[Stuster]

I would much rather see the points scored for each of the top 3 beers in a class from the same brewer get added together to determine the individual award, a much better representation of the quality of the beers from that brewer than a 3,2,1 which we see used a lot around the place for awards but is a very poor way of determining the winner given the extra weighting applied.

Why didn't you say that earlier? :angry: :lol:

 

[Darren]

I'm not saying anything needs to be fixed at a National level, but at our club level where we have some pretty serious prizes for champion brewer (trips to USA brewing), we are using the following criteria for selecting champion brewer.

1) All entrants are restricted to max 6 entries - Stops carpet bombing, makes you think about which beers to enter & gives us maxium entry numbers that we can plan for.
2) Only your 4 best placed beers (points: 3 for 1st, 2 for 2nd, 1 for third) across 4 different catergorys count towards Champion Brewer - Encourages brewers to brew different styles especially where there may be fewer entries & also allows brewers that don't have the time to brew dozens of brews for comp time to have an equal chance, as they only need to brew 4 beers.

The above also helps with judging, as their are still plenty of catergorys left for participating judges to judge without juding their own.


Cheers Ross

Ross,

That looks like a good model.

cheers

Darren