Bjcp scores?

Ok so I entered 2 desperate entries into a small local octoberfest competition near here. I entered in 10a just a regular pale I had laying around and then in 10b with an amber I had made (with some formulating help from a friend) that was designed to have the amber malt/color but was high on citrus and hop flavors.

I just got my sheets today and was actually surprised with the good feedback. Maybe I was a little harsh on my own brews but I knew both had some flaws.

Anyway both scored what I thought was surprisingly well. I didn't get 50s but I got a more positive response than I had anticipated.

Just curious what others consider a "good" score in competitions?? Obviously we all strive for perfect scores but barring that what are you usually satisfied with?

I can't remember my exact scores from the first and only competition I entered but I was happy with them. Surprisingly my favorite beer did worse than I expected and my second fav beer did really well. Both were praised for the quality, appearance, and flavor.

Take the feedback with a grain of salt. They're not telling you how great your beer is to drink, they are telling you how close they perceive it to be to the style. This is subject to interpretation and honestly will vary from person to person, day to day, your spot in the lineup, etc. The same beer submitted 10x will likely get 10 different scores. Just use them as a guideline to detect major flaws in your beer. Still they are pretty cool.

Brewing to make a tasty beer and brewing to win a BJCP contest are two totally different things though.

Why not just go with what the BJCP says their scores mean?

Outstanding (45 - 50): World-class example of style
Excellent (38 - 44): Exemplifies style well, requires minor fine-tuning
Very Good (30 - 37): Generally within style parameters, some minor flaws
Good (21 - 29): Misses the mark on style and/or minor flaws
Fair (14 - 20): Off flavors, aromas or major style deficiencies
Problematic (0 - 13): Major off flavors and aromas dominate

I've only entered two competitions and scored in the high 20's both times. I considered that pretty good since I was pretty much just entering on a lark and not trying to perfect a beer to win a competition. If I was really trying, I'd say I'd be very happy with anything over a 30.

All that said, I wouldn't worry too much about the numerical score. The feedback is really the important part. I'm a "middle of the road" brewer and it's just the nature of the game that beers toward the edges of the style categories get noticed over the dozens, or possibly hundreds of "standard" examples. At that point, getting a good score becomes more of a game of brinksmanship rather than a matter of craftsmanship.

Well I hardly consider myself a "great" brewer, but it certainly was nice to see that my 2 entries were well recieved and judging by the comments pretty well liked by the judges. I entered 1 competition maybe 5 years ago and did not score well, but that was mostly as expected. Due to family (i currently have a 3 year old and 6 mo old) I had not brewed much in a while and have just started getting back into the hobby.

I just happened to have these 2 brews ready when this "competition" rolled around so I figured why not. I know a few people who brew and do a LOT better job than I do, my father in law does competition entries and has done quite well a lot of the time. Again maybe it's being hard on my own stuff but I think things he does generally turn out much better than my own.

All that said, both these beers i was happy with and thought both had great flavors. I Knew each had a relative flaw, so mostly I was looking to see if that's what the judges picked up as well. For the most part it exactly was so I would say I'm most happy about that and that they didn't find any other major issues that I was unaware of.

I agree with what cvstrat said, I brewed these beers mostly for me drink (although one of them ended up being served at a local brew fest the same day as the competition) so I was not completely concerned with style when I brewed. But it was nice to know that what I did ended up working out well on both sides of the coin (so to speak).

I've noticed it's all up to the judge and location. I've entered the same beer in multiple comps and taken away multiple range of scores/places.

Also what one judge states is completely untrue, or the other judge had 100% different comments than the first judge. just my $0.02.

I was told by a Nationally ranked BJCP judge that anything in the 30's is a great score, and to break 40 the beer has to be absolutely amazing, and without flaws. Nobody scores a 50, you can typically place in the 30's, and will almost always win a category if you're in the 40's.

The one beer that I had score a 42 took first in it's category and went on to win best in show in a rather large competition. I have 1, 2, and 3rd place medals from beers that scored in the 30's, and a stack of score sheets in the 20's too.

That being said, I'm happy to be in the mid-high 30's or above....but I enter competitions to win medals.

Here is a PDF from BJCP on how to interpret your score.

http://www.bjcp.org/docs/SCP_CoverSheet.pdf

42 doesn't always win a catagory as I found out. My flawed hefe (36) got a silver and my specialty beer (42) bronze. I was floored I wanted to taste the winner.

Bobbybob said:

42 doesn't always win a catagory as I found out. My flawed hefe (36) got a silver and my specialty beer (42) bronze. I was floored I wanted to taste the winner.

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Those are high scores! I rarely see a beer over 40 in competitions. Either the judges were scoring high or that competition had some of the world's best beers in it!

I did see a beer (an APA) that scored a 42 in a competition I judged several years ago. It was a wonderful pale ale, and it definitely was worth a 42.

Highest was 38 and I won third place, lowest is 27 and the score sheets describe a beer that wasn't mine. They screwed up so my sheet had the score and notes intended for someone's orange porter. I got marked down for lack of flavors I said were there. Again, it was a mix up of beers and as far as I can tell, mine was either not judged at all or someone else who made an orange porter got my score.

My third place beer actually didn't place in another competition. The only bummer is the competition I did place in, they never gave me my ribbon. I wanted a ribbon.

3rd place on my 42 pale ale

2nd place with a 31 on a dunkelweizen.


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I got honorable mention for a cream ale and an American wheat. I got rave reviews from everybody who tried them, but I have to imagine these were somewhat inflated scores. I think I got a 40 for both. This was the Michigan Homebrew Festival from 2013.

Like I said, they were really good but certainly not world class or anything like that. I took more from the comments than the numbers. (The comments were exceptionally helpful, which was nice because I entered to get feedback not medals...not that I would have turned a medal down)

Hops4life said:

Just curious what others consider a "good" score in competitions?? Obviously we all strive for perfect scores but barring that what are you usually satisfied with?

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It really depends on the beer and the category (and to some extent the competition). I may consider a 29 for my strong scotch ale a horrible score, but a 31 for a 21A wheat beer may be an acceptable score. The best I can hope for is the beer I sent comes across how I expect. I'm generally not going to send anything I expect to score less than mid-30s to a competition, so in most cases that's the baseline I consider 'good', but specialty categories are hard to predict since you never know the tastes of the judges or what's grouped around you in a flight.

Yooper said:

Those are high scores! I rarely see a beer over 40 in competitions. Either the judges were scoring high or that competition had some of the world's best beers in it!

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In my experience, it's more common for small/local comps to score high since there's an extremely good chance the judges know the brewers (even if they don't know who brewed each specific beer). Bigger comps when you see a beer score a 42, it probably was that good, although that's still no guarantee it won't lose to a 33 point beer in the Mini-BoS.

Yooper said:

I did see a beer (an APA) that scored a 42 in a competition I judged several years ago. It was a wonderful pale ale, and it definitely was worth a 42.

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Maybe is was his - strat_thru_marshall - afterall, he posted those scores a few years ago

Apparently I scored a 45 on an IPA from a competition this past weekend. But as far as I can see on the website it didn't get first, second or third in its category. Only about 23 entries in that category too. Still waiting for the score sheets to come in the mail to see the notes. I can only wonder what the scores were of the beers that took the top three spots.


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Double post

jeremytd301 said:

Apparently I scored a 45 on an IPA from a competition this past weekend. But as far as I can see on the website it didn't get first, second or third in its category. Only about 23 entries in that category too. Still waiting for the score sheets to come in the mail to see the notes. I can only wonder what the scores were of the beers that took the top three spots.

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They probably weren't higher scoring. With 23 entries, the category was probably divided into 2 or 3 flights with 5 or 6 beers pushed to mini-BOS. Unfortunately, there's always some subjectivity in judging, and the judges that scored your beer highly may not have participated in the mini-BOS. At that point, you're at the mercy of a new set of judges' palates who are debating which beer best represents the substyle and category as a whole. Just as a for example, I had a wheat beer in category 6 (technically it was all of category 6 except Kolsch) score really well and advance to mini-BOS, but the beers that placed were either cream ales or blondes. Obviously the mini-BOS judges had a little different preference to what the best in that category was. Did you notice if maybe the beers that placed were in a different substyle?

I recently entered two beers into a competition. A Berliner Weiese and a Fruit Beer The fruit beer was from the same batch as the Berliner except it had homemade key lime extract added at bottling. The Fruit beer scored a 45 and took second. The Berliner scored a 22. This was the base beer for the other! Who knows.

TobyG said:

They probably weren't higher scoring. With 23 entries, the category was probably divided into 2 or 3 flights with 5 or 6 beers pushed to mini-BOS. Unfortunately, there's always some subjectivity in judging, and the judges that scored your beer highly may not have participated in the mini-BOS. At that point, you're at the mercy of a new set of judges' palates who are debating which beer best represents the substyle and category as a whole. Just as a for example, I had a wheat beer in category 6 (technically it was all of category 6 except Kolsch) score really well and advance to mini-BOS, but the beers that placed were either cream ales or blondes. Obviously the mini-BOS judges had a little different preference to what the best in that category was. Did you notice if maybe the beers that placed were in a different substyle?

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Some of the styles were grouped together. I guess if certain styles didn't get many entries. But this one was 23 entries in Style 14. I am guessing they were all in the same group. Last year I think they had two judges do each beer. Because I think I remember getting two sets of notes for each entry last year. And then they average those two scores together to get your score.



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jeremytd301 said:

Some of the styles were grouped together. I guess if certain styles didn't get many entries. But this one was 23 entries in Style 14. I am guessing they were all in the same group. Last year I think they had two judges do each beer. Because I think I remember getting two sets of notes for each entry last year. And then they average those two scores together to get your score.

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What I'm saying is that there were probably at least 2 pairs of judges for the category (possibly even 3 pairs). They would have split the 23 entries between the pairs and then pushed 2 or 3 from each pair of judges to the mini-BOS. The mini-BOS would have then had 2 or 3 judges (maybe not even any of the original judges) debating those 5 or 6 beers and deciding which ones would place with potentially no knowledge of how they scored at all. Sometimes you may get judges for mini-BOS with different preferences than the scoring judges. So, if you had an American IPA, but the mini-BOS judges are more familiar with or prefer English IPAs or IIPAs, then they may lean that way for choosing places.

Now I gotcha. Still curious to get my score sheets and see the feedback.


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For whoever said those scores were high and maybe judges were scoring high? People are inconsistent I know but generally they should be pretty close. Judges are well trained and the scoring system is set in stone. I got three golds in one competition last year. Two 46,s. A Maibach scored me a 46.2 and a double Boch a 46.4:rockin:

4 judges , only one from this state much less the area. You score 40+ you got a great beer don't let anyone fool you and damn sure don't full yourself

bhensgens said:

For whoever said those scores were high and maybe judges were scoring high? People are inconsistent I know but generally they should be pretty close. Judges are well trained and the scoring system is set in stone. I got three golds in one competition last year. Two 46,s. A Maibach scored me a 46.2 and a double Boch a 46.4:rockin:

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Hate to break it to you, but the scoring system is certainly not set in stone, and the training that most judges receive is nominal. The only well trained judges are going to be those in an area with a plethora of National or higher ranked judges. Other than that, it's a very open system, and Recognized or Certified judge training (and scoring) is going to be all over the map (I'm saying this as a Certified judge).