Home Brewers Take a Shot at “Longshot”
The folks at the Boston Beer Company are dead serious when they discuss the importance of the Home-Brewing movement as a driving force behind America’s Craft beer industry. So much so that in 2006, BBC’s founder and President Jim Koch announced very unique annual competition to pay homage to all of us garage brewing alchemists. It’s called the Samuel Adam’s Longshot competition. This competition opens up the opportunity for two home brewers and one Boston Beer Company employee to have their winning beer entries scaled-up and brewed in an industrial size batch then promoted and sold in the special release “Longshot mix six-pack” Brewers are also paid a $5000.00 royalty and flown out to The Great American Beer Festival for the awards ceremony.
Last weekend I had the opportunity to participate as a judge in the 2009 Sam Adam’s Longshot Competition, which is broken into three regional judging areas in the U.S. I judged at the Boston regional. The competition is sanctioned and organized just like a normal AHA/BJCP sanctioned home brewing competition except entry into the contest is free of charge as to encourage more brewers to enter.
This year’s competition featured over 1500 entries broken down into the 23 BJCP style categories. Our group at the Boston Regional judged 653 entries in one day! (split into three rounds). This was something in way of a logistical miracle, but good organization, great stewards and qualified judges make a world of difference.
Sam Adam’s picked up the hotel room for the volunteers as well as buying us dinner after a long day of judging. The hotel bar had several Sam Adam’s beers at special prices but we were all pretty much “Beered-out” by dinner time, so they could have been free (and were during dinner) and it would have made no difference. It was off to bed early and up very early for my flight home.
The regional finalists are then sent on to Boston Beer Company where a group of BBC’s brewers and other beer industry VIP’s will select the winners. Winners will be announced in September at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver.
May 21st, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Are you allowed to “leak” the people or at least styles that were sent on to be finalists ? How many were sent on ?
May 22nd, 2009 at 8:54 am
Ron, I had to fly home very early on Sunday. They had to move the regional Best of Show round to Sunday so I could not judge that round…
May 22nd, 2009 at 9:54 am
Picked up a case of Longshot in Bridgeville,PA,
on my way to the Springsteen concert in Pittsburgh.
Of the three, I preferred the IPA. The Bock was
ok, and the Cranberry Wit, well, it’s a fruited beer…
May 22nd, 2009 at 1:14 pm
One of the past couple issues of BYO (brew your own) Magazine had an article about and recipes for the 3 Longshots Alan refers to above. I can’t remember exactly which issue. I think one of the first Longshot winners later admitted he was trying to clone Pliny the Elder. What’s the saying “immitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” ? I just wish I was confident enough in my homebrewing to even enter.
May 22nd, 2009 at 1:23 pm
Ron, one of the good things is that entry is free (you still have to ship the beer). What you get for free is an objective review and comment of your beer by certified BJCP judges. This is good information for any brewer. It’s a great way to improve your brewing skills.
May 23rd, 2009 at 7:47 am
maybe next year …..?
August 1st, 2009 at 10:34 am
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