National Homebrew Competition Sees Changes in 2013

The American Homebrewers Association (AHA) is proud to organize the world's largest beer competition annually, the National Homebrew Competition (NHC), and we're humbled by the tremendous interest and support the NHC has enjoyed from homebrewers everywhere.

The record-setting growth that the competition has experienced in the last several years has been wonderful-and introduced its own challenges to be navigated. Over the past few years, the AHA staff and Governing Committee have worked together to implement changes to the competition to streamline the process and maintain high-quality judging.

Specifically, in recent years the NHC has:

Introduced online entry registration;
Established a limit of 750 entries that any one judge center can accept to ensure quality judging, while simultaneously eliminating restrictions on which judge center entrants can submit to;
Added an additional judge center (in 2012);
Provided supplemental support for first round judge centers.

In 2012, each U.S. judge center filled to its capacity of 750 entries within 48 hours of online entry registration opening-this despite an additional new judge center.

For 2013 NHC, the AHA Governing Committee's Competition Subcommittee has implemented several changes aimed at responding to the competition's growth and further improving upon the quality of the judging. Specifically, 2013 NHC competition rules and organization include the following:

1. New entry cap. Each entrant may submit no more than 15 entries. Previously there was no maximum number of entries per entrant.

2. The addition of an 11^th U.S. judging site.*

3. A requirement of two bottles per entry for all first round entries. This will increase the quality of judging by allowing for fresh bottles to be judged for winner selection in mini-best-of-show rounds.

4. More specific criteria for Ninkasi Award tie breaker. The introduction of an entry cap increases the likelihood of multiple entrants tying for points earned in the final round of the competition. The new tie breaking criteria will help to ensure the most qualified entrant takes the award.

5. Implementation of a new database and entry registration software. The 2013 NHC will use a modified version of the popular Brew Competition Online Entry Management program. This change will streamline the data entry process for competition site directors and shorten the time it takes to get data back to the NHC director, which ultimately should mean a quicker turnaround in communicating results to entrants.

6. Entry fee increase of an additional $2 per entry. The additional revenue generated from this fee increase will fund enhancements to support first round judge centers that are intended improve the judging experience.

Each of these changes is designed to allow more AHA members to participate in the competition while simultaneously improving upon the quality of the competition.

Still, it is likely that the competition will sell out again this year. The reality is that there are more people interested in entering the NHC than there are places with enough judges to host additional judge centers. With recent changes being made to the Beer Judge Certification Program, the AHA hopes that more qualified judges will be available for future competitions, allowing the AHA to continue to expand the NHC and accommodate as many AHA members that wish enter the competition as possible.

*There will no longer be a separate Canadian qualifying competition as part of the National Homebrew Competition. Canadian residents wishing to enter the NHC should send entries directly to one of the U.S. judging centers. This change is being made in part due to requests from Canadian entrants who would prefer to enter at U.S. judging centers that in many cases are closer than the Canadian qualifying competition. The change also reflects the fact that currently there are vastly more AHA members in the U.S. than in Canada.

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COMMENTS

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John Hoover 01.24.13

I think that these changes overall are very positive for the NHC. This effectively brings an end to competition "entry flooding", opening up the medals (and potentially the Ninkasi) to the average homebrewer. By "average homebrewer" I simply mean someone that brews well for the joy of it, but isn't necessarily interested or able to supply a barrage of homebrew aimed at dominating the event.

Martin Brungard 01.24.13

My compliments to the Competition committee. These changes will help get judges to the competition sites and improve the quality of evaluation and feedback.

Nathan Zorich 01.25.13

I'm glad to see that an entry cap has been adopted for the NHC. Not only will it allow more people to enter and get feedback on their beer - it prevents flooding the comp. and forces entrance to select only their best beers After all, for me homebrewing is about quality over quantity. B.O.G. Brewers of the Gorge WA / OR

Bill Lynch 01.25.13

I appreciate that you're looking to make changes but members of my club purposely put 4 beers of their finest aside for entry and unfortunately many are lagers so they're not able to be re-brewed. Much more notice would have been appreciated. $12 and potentially 5 beers seems a bit excessive especially when I took BOS in a competition that required three beers to be submitted but 2 broke in transit. They were able to work with the one.

Bill Pierce 01.26.13

Two years ago I was one of the Canadian homebrewers who complained that Canadians were being treated differently from other contest entrants. It seemed unfair that US entrants were able to enter any regional competition they wished, while Canadians were required to enter their beers in the Canadian region only. Abolishing the Canadian region altogether seems a radical way to eliminate this distinction. While indeed many Canadian entrants are closer to one of the US regional competitions, this is not universally the case. It's very clear that those who devised this solution have never tried to ship beer across the border. From a strictly legal standpoint, it requires an export-import license, something that as a practical matter only a commercial enterprise would have. Those Americans who complain about being forced to resort to subterfuge in order to send entries via the usual shipping companies have it very easy by comparison. All packages shipped across the US-Canada border are now x-rayed, which makes the contents easily visible. Some Canadians, myself included, live close enough to the border to be able to hand carry entries across and then ship them from US soil, but this is hardly the case for everyone. Explicitly mentioning that Canadians are only a small percentage of members demonstrates that the AHA does not really care about making the efforts necessary to accommodate and include them. It further isolates Canadians and makes us feel that we are somehow located behind the Maple Leaf Curtain in Canuckistan and not part of the larger North American world. The AHA should do better than this.

Jeff Gladish 02.10.13

I'm happy that the one bottle first round rule has been changed to two. As a judge I would find it very difficult to give a half-bottle a good evaluation if it advanced to the second round, especially if it had been bottle-conditioned.

Tim Pewitt 02.12.13

If the intent was to allow more members to participate, how did the AHA come up with 15 as the cap? I understand there are prolific brewers out there, but surely you could have spread the field a little wider. Many years ago as a new brewer, I was awarded a first round ribbon....validating that I was headed in the right direction. Not accepting an entry from a new/novice brewer, while someone else gets 15 does not make any sense. If growing the hobby is the intent of the AHA, and I think it should be lets work towards a more reasonable (lower) limit. More brewers entering = greater growth of the industry......isn't that the purpose of an Association?

Duane 02.28.13

I was very disappointed that I was unable to register for the competition this year. I was at work when the website open up and by the time I got home the registration had closed. There seems to be some glitches which I am not for sure what that means. Will I be able to registrar once AHB has worked everything out? There seems to be some openings in other centers. Can I please make some suggestions for next year. Start the registration in the evening hours or on the weekend. Thus allowing more people the opportunity to register. Limit the number of entries from 15 to 5. Let's face it those of us that compete know that only a couple of our beers have a realistic chance of going to the second round why keep good brewers and good beers out of the competition because someone else put in 15 entries with 10 of them being junk beers. The other option is to increase the entry fee to say $20 and that would weed out a lot of junk beer from being entered. Instead of having an over all limit of 750 have a limit per style. For example, the current set up could have 200 entries in the IPA category thus leaving 550 slots for the other categories. Which could mean that a killer Baltic Porter might not be able to be judge because the shear number of IPA's. I would think that AHB would be interested in promoting the welfare of ALL beer categories and not just the ones that seem to be the hot fade of the day. These are just some thoughts that I hope that the powers that may be would consider for next year.

William Moreland 03.01.13

I tried to enter this year on the 26th but the web site was shutdown due to glitches. Apparently registration was opened up yesterday but I was totally unaware of it (and at work of course) and never gto my entry in (a local Best of Show winner). I've judged the first round in San Diego the past five years and heartily agree that many brewers enter everything they've got and the competition suffers because of it. I've scored many NHC entries in the 20s that probably shouldn't have been entered. I agree with previous comments that the number of entries per brewer should be more llimited and the entry fee raised.

Duane 03.02.13

In the spirit of March Madness, here is an idea. Why don't we have the sanction AHA competitions actually mean something? For example, the only way you can qualify to enter the National AHA competition is to win, place or show in the category that your entry was in. It could break down as such, each region (hopefully 12) will have so many AHA sanction competitions throughout the year (preferably 15 that qualify). Those entries that won their category will get an automatic invitation. Those that came in second and third in their category will be allowed to enter that category as space allows, no more then 30 entries per category. Entry fee's should be $10 for first place, $15 for second place, and $20 for third place, I would also propose if your entry happen to get best of show then your entry fee should drop down to $5. The reasoning for the difference in pricing structure is to weed out some of the lesser beers from entering, thus making the competition a truer picture of champions. If your beer did not place in one of the events in the previous year then you don't qualify to enter. Your beer must be entered in the region that it competed in so no going to other regions unless you competed in that region and placed. If a brewer should happen to place in two or more regions with the same beer in the same category then the brewer will have to determine which region he will compete in. He can only choose one region for that entry. The finial round will include first and second place finishers from each region in each category. The goal is to have in both the first round and in the finial round somewhere between 20-30 entries in each category that have either won or placed in a AHA sanction competition in the previous year. By setting up the National AHA competition this way several things will be accomplished. 1-An assurance the the best of the best are actually in the competition. 2-Reducing the rush for enter and any glitches that might occur. 3-A true champion of champions will be determined. 4-Finially, giving credence to the local AHA sanction competitions by promoting involvement in the local competitions in order to qualify for the nations. I hope this is an idea that AHA will consider for the future national AHA events.

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