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This year’s largest annual commercial beer festival and competition did so much more than give a venue for beer lovers to cut loose and revel in suds ’til total inebriation. The Brewers Association, with clarion planning, stricter guidelines and a well-designed 400,000 square feet of event space made the 35th Annual GABF something to behold.
Featuring so many on-site activities such as the Meet the Brewer section, “The Backyard” (an adult gaming playground with a dance-club vibe), constant educational sessions, the Pro-Am Competition, a designated driver lounge, book signings in the “Beer Geek Bookstore” and the ever-more artistic booth designs breweries are dreaming up, this festival is almost acting it’s age.
Uinta’s National Forest sampling booth sported an awesome camping motif.
With so many tap-takeovers, collaboration invites, rare and wild beer festivals outside the halls, you might understand why the BA is trying their hardest to maximize the money paid by those who throw down $65 to $80 per session. And with public tickets selling-out in just over an hours’ time, it’s clear that those peripheral events are simply complimentary overflow.
The best moment of the weekend had to be watching a full-house of brewers paying tribute to craft beer’s patriarch, Charlie Papazian, on this 35th year of the festival he started in 1982. Right in the middle of the presentation of awards, unbeknownst to Papazian, Governor John Hickenlooper (co-founder of the state’s first brewpub) came out to present the visibly emotional Charlie with his own over-sized gold medal, his first ever received at the ceremony.
Moments like this, whether it be the troop of Scottish bagpipers who marched through the hall, the brewers panel that discussed “Why Independence Matters,” or the wider spaces between booths, it all spelled out that the industry is undaunted by the ever increasing size and savvy nature of craft beer’s fan base and an ever bulging attendance topping 60,000.
With the BA’s increased emphasis on quality assurance, articulate food + beer pairings, and a more sophisticated than ever artisanal beer fan base, it’s clear that times continue to change for the better at GABF. All the more evidenced by this excerpt from the BA’s press release on how the most-entered categories are becoming more varied and complex…
More Details on the 2016 GABF Awards Style Categories
Since 2002, the most-entered category has been American-Style India Pale Ale (IPA), which saw 312 entries in 2016 compared to 336 entries in 2015.The top five entered categories were:
- American-Style India Pale Ale (312 entries)
- Imperial India Pale Ale (211 entries)
- American-Style Strong Pale Ale (169 entries)
- Coffee Beer (168 entries)
- Wood- and Barrel-Aged Strong Beer (159 entries)
In 2015, the top-five entered style categories included Session India Pale Ale and American-Style Pale Ale, which did not make the top five this year. New in the top five in 2016 compared to last year are American-Style Strong Pale Ale and Coffee Beer.
The average number of competition beers entered in each category was 75—up from 72 in 2015— making the 2016 Great American Beer Festival competition the most competitive ever.
The winners in the most-entered (that is, the most competitive) categories were:
American-Style India Pale Ale (312 entries)
Gold: Bodhizafa IPA, Georgetown Brewing Co., Seattle, Wash.
Silver: Super Cali IPA, Riip Beer Co., Huntington Beach, Calif.
Bronze: Breaking Bud, Knee Deep Brewing Co., Auburn, Calif.
Imperial India Pale Ale (211 entries)
Gold: Humulus Insani, Überbrew, Billings, Mont.
Silver: Nobility, Noble Ale Works, Anaheim, Calif.
Bronze: Hop JuJu Imperial IPA, Fat Head’s Brewery, Middleburg Heights, Ohio
American-Style Strong Pale Ale (169 entries)
Gold: Good Green, Highland Park Brewery, Los Angeles, Calif.
Silver: Rippin, Sunriver Brewing, Sunriver, Ore.
Bronze: HFS, Alpine Beer Co., San Diego, Calif.
Coffee Beer (168 entries)
Gold: Gusto Crema, Georgetown Brewing Co., Seattle Wash.
Silver: Dusk ‘til Dawn – SC, Pizza Port San Clemente, San Clemente, Calif.
Bronze: Zumbar Chocolate Coffee Imperial Stout, New English Brewing Co., San Diego, Calif.
Wood- and Barrel-Aged Strong Beer (159 entries)
Gold: Silent Warrior, TAPS Fish House and Brewery – Corona, Corona, Calif.
Silver: Mélange À Trois, Nebraska Brewing Co. – Papillion, Papillion, Neb.
Bronze: 15th Anniversary Ale, Island Brewing Co., Carpinteria, Calif.
Excerpt courtesy of the Brewers Association. All photography by Warren Wills
