Becoming a tasting judge?

there's quite a few judges here. Even a couple GMs.
<-- Master Judge and lead exam grader.

studying to become a judge helped my brewing a great deal, period. I'm not sure that the average single judging session improves my brewing much, but I do still occasionally get good ideas from beers I judge.

send me a beermail with any questions; I'm happy to help.

cheers--
--Michael

 

Another Judge here, I'm Certified. My experience as a judge has been great, I get to drink free beer

As far as making your beer better? I think it has. I think the most important thing it teaches you is it refines your palate for you to pick of flavors (good or bad). Which in turn leads you to adjust your ingredients and processes at home.

 

Yeah, but you also get to drink some crappy free beer. I'll never forget a scoresheet comment I got back one time. (I think it was on an IPA.) It said "Thank You for making good beer." I could sense the desperation of a judge having a bad day.

 

I'd say the biggest help has been the introduction to styles (some obscure and esoteric) that I probably wouldn't have gone out of my way to try immediately.

If you'd like to become a judge, start by becoming familiar with these: http://www.bjcp.org/2008styles/catdex.php
and then decide if you want to go through this process: http://www.bjcp.org/examcenter.php

or not...there are plenty of knowledgeable folks that aren't certified...certified by a different organization...or are very motivated and self-taught.

For myself, I think the homebrewing has helped more with the certification than the other way around.

 

The last time I judged 50% was bad. The best beer I judged was a Barley Wine that was entered as a Saison.

 

...yes, have had similar experiences, but the bad beers are definitely easier to write up than the really good ones...I mean what can you really say/add about a world class beer without regurgitating the style guidelines and giving the brewer a blow job (figuratively speaking )?

 

I originally studied to become a judge to improve my beers, but quickly lost sight of that goal when I found that judging opened up a whole new appreciation for beer, in general. My beers have, indeed, improved, but not in the context of my original goal. Rather, it was due to my overall increased exposure to what's right and what can go wrong with homebrew. Granted, the exposure was due to judging, but that's not the path I had in mind. Then there's the social aspect that was totally unanticipated. Bottom line is, I would do it again in a heartbeat.

Despite the contorted path toward the same goal, I hope that made sense.

 

I have not put "I feel like I'm being poisoned." or "what did I ever do to you?!?" or "have you considered stamp collecting?" on a scoresheet. But after yet another fusel-filled flight of Belgian Strongs I've been tempted.

 

Interesting, over the past year or so I havent really had excessive bad beers in the flights I've judge. It's been a bell curve for me; 1-2 really outstanding beers, 7-8 good beers (minor flaws), 1-2 straight to dump bucket beers.

I got around to judge 7 competitions last year, so my sample size may be small.

 

I am at Certified level. You learn the limitation of your palate. You do find what you are sensitive too. It has helped me make better beer.

OP - see if you can find a BJCP training class in your area. Ask the local clubs if anyone is putting one on. That is one thing I did before the test, and it helped.

 

I am gearing up to take the BJCP next year as we have seats for Feb 2015 Exam. We are going to start our first study session on Monday night. I just finished typing and organizing and picturing a 10 page tech article on yeast and fermentation for it a few minutes ago.

Honestly if I had not started reviewing commercial beers on BA a few years ago, reviewed every homebrew I have made in 3+ years, and most importantly started judging my clubs COC I would not be anywhere near ready to do the tasting portion of the exam next year.
I would recommend a few things.

• Help out in your clubs COC.
• Scour this site's reviews for beers you can easily get where some people with crazy good palates have reviewed the beer, go buy it, review it, then go over it with them, try to find what they find.
• Do the same with the reviews from the Bros in the back of the BA mag each month if you can get the beers.
• Do the same with the back pages of Zymurgy (try to find some of those flavors in a beer, I dare you!).

Grow your palate and vocabulary as much as possible, then start studying for the test.

 

The AHA CoC went away this last year. Maybe that is not what you are talking about, but I think it was.
Look at the Commercial Calibration in each issue of Zymurgy.

 

Yeah, our club still does COC anyways.

 

Things I've wanted to put on scoresheets, but did not:

"It's like the bacteria have little jackhammers and they're drilling holes in my tongue".

"Out of style; Toilet Fermented Prison Hooch goes in Cat. 23" (this 'witbier' actually did have a strong fecal aroma).

"If you ever brew again, I'll hunt you down and kill you".

OP: Don't let this scare you. Happily, awful beers are more and more the rare exceptions. Most entries are pretty decent these days. It's been a couple of years since I scored a beer below 20 points.

 

FWIW, the mood lightens up a bit and the inhibitions start to fall by the wayside during the afternoon session, especially in cases where the taps are open during lunch. I've seen some ... um ...interesting comments on my scoresheets for some of my bigger beers. I understand where they're coming from, so I'm offended by them.

 

Hey, if such obviously professional drinkers have issues with your beer maybe it don't drink so good

Yep, it happens. I've had co-judges topple backward off their chairs in the pm session... and even worse, take my smartass comments seriously. For my beers, I have numerous scoresheets where the judges failed to calculate their scores correctly... ok if it's in my favor