One aspect to bear in mind when having friends or judges who know you judge beers known by them to be yours is that they are probably more likely to be favorable toward them (not saying that they would ignore a flaw that is readily perceptible), probably without even consciously thinking about it. I am not saying your beers are anything less than stellar (I am sure that they must be given your numerous high scores at BB); I'm just pointing out a potential positive bias in the process you undertook for them to evaluate your beers.
As stated earlier - brew for you and your friends and don't worry about the competition brewing - whether you enter them or not. And I am sure that you will not run out of people willing to taste them!
What you say certainly makes sense! The experienced beer judges (Husband & Wife team) are from Austin, Texas. They were very active in the beer scene there, taking part in many brewing comps and volunteering as stewards, plus judging. Dave has many, many medals for his beers!
They were both members of a large brew club there also. And Dave was a brewer at Community Brewing, in Austin.
Honestly, their objectivity does not get lost regarding tasting my beers. They are in their 40's, and have a much keener palate than I do. Being in my 60's, my taste buds have lost some ability to perceive some things.
I have told them both to be honest, and forget we know each other. The best friend is one who will tell you when your beer is good, and who will tell you when it's not good. And they have told me when my beer was not good!!! Point blank, to my face. With all the grace of a sledgehammer!
Both Dave and his wife (and the rest of us) went over the remarks, while tasting the beer. The only one they agreed with (slightly) was my Helles did have an underlying hop bitterness. But it was not "Pilsner like" at all.
It's not a big deal. It's beer, after all. But I do take it seriously. Just like I took flying a 777 seriously.
Correction: The judges were correct on my Festbier...it is an SRM 9. The BJCP top limit is 7.
edit: Full disclosure...I was deeply disappointed with the results. The Munich Helles was one of my best beers, and was spot on. The German Pils was brewed specifically for this comp, and was a classic example. I pushed the IBU's to the edge of the envelope on this one.
My Festbier was not great, and we did not expect it to do well.
All of our entries were "one & done".