Return-Path: owner-judge at synchro.com Received: from srvr22.engin.umich.edu (root at srvr22.engin.umich.edu [141.212.2.35]) by srvr5.engin.umich.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id KAA04007 for ; Mon, 6 Apr 1998 10:30:52 -0400 (EDT) Received: from redheat.rs.itd.umich.edu (redheat.rs.itd.umich.edu [141.211.83.36]) by srvr22.engin.umich.edu (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id KAA06104 for ; Mon, 6 Apr 1998 10:30:48 -0400 (EDT) Received: (from root at localhost) by redheat.rs.itd.umich.edu (8.8.5/2.5) with X.500 id KAA20036; Mon, 6 Apr 1998 10:30:44 -0400 (EDT) Received: from uu6.psi.com (uu6.psi.com [38.145.155.3]) by redheat.rs.itd.umich.edu (8.8.5/2.5) with SMTP id KAA19852; Mon, 6 Apr 1998 10:30:27 -0400 (EDT) Received: by uu6.psi.com (5.65b/4.0.071791-PSI/PSINet) via UUCP; id AA05536 for spencer at umich.edu; Mon, 6 Apr 98 09:25:41 -0400 Received: (from majordom at localhost) by synchro.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id IAA22703 for judge-digest-outgoing; Mon, 6 Apr 1998 08:33:52 -0400 Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1998 08:33:52 -0400 Message-Id: <199804061233.IAA22703 at synchro.com> From: owner-judge-digest at synchro.com To: judge-digest at synchro.com Subject: judge-digest V1 #1564 Reply-To: judge at synchro.com Errors-To: owner-judge-digest at synchro.com Precedence: bulk Status: RO X-Status: judge-digest Monday, 6 April 1998 Volume 01 : Number 1564 ============================================================================ J u d g e N e t - t h e b e e r j u d g e d i g e s t ============================================================================ Moderator: Chuck Cox Archivist: Spencer Thomas Publisher: SynchroSystems Submissions: judge at synchro.com Subscriptions: judge-request at synchro.com Archive: http://realbeer.com/spencer/judge BJCP info: geninfo at bjcp.synchro.com ============================================================================ contents: (a lot) More on scoresheets New AHA Score Sheets RE: points for appearance score sheet request Have we any money ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Jeremy Bergsman Date: Sat, 04 Apr 1998 18:44:01 -0800 Subject: (a lot) More on scoresheets "Bryan L. Gros" wrote: > Jeremy wrote: > >For example I recently judged in the wonderful World Cup of Beer final > >round. There were 4 experienced judges on the flight and on most of the > >beers our scores fell in a 3 point range without any discussion. This... > > But also point out that this flight was dry stout, and all beers qualified > for the four points for color and clarity, and the majority qualified for > two points for head. I simply meant that overall I feel calibrated with other judges, so the efforts I go through to arrive at my final score such that it turns out to be the same as what other (in this case experienced) judges give are potentially interesting. My method and my subscores may not be "perfect" or even very good, but they are the best I know how and I notice I didn't see any criticism except for Bill's which I will address below. The fact that these beers were more likely to get perfect appearance scores is true, but most judges can get within 1 point of other judges on appearance, so this doesn't diminish our tight scoring much. > But the new question is how important is appearance for a beer? If a > beer is way too dark or light, is that a very minor point? Is appearance > only worth 6% of a score (3/50)? Or is 12% more appropriate? Quite right, I didn't address this too directly. It is true that on the new sheets it is impossible to strongly punish a very ugly beer. I submit that a beer that is really off in appearance is very likely to to be off in other ways. If the color is off, the grain bill was wrong; if it is very cloudy, maybe it's contaminated or very yeasty or if it's a starch haze, probably the mash didn't go too well and there will be body, sweetness, etc. problems. If there is no head it may well be quite thin, although that might be desired.... I challenge people to think of a beer that received <=2 on appearance that got more than 24 overall. If you put a 0 down for appearance on the new sheet I think you're sending the brewer the message.... Bill Giffin wrote: > I have yet to see the new score sheets, but 12 for aroma is too high. I > feel that aroma should go to 6 and the balance of 4 goes to flavor. I have > three reasons for this. > 1. Many of the places where we judge beer have a lot of aroma in the air > which makes it difficult to properly smell anything, let alone give a > realistic score. While unfortunately true, I don't favor this reason. We should be working on better judging sites, not adjusting the scoresheets. > 2. Many of the beer styles have very little aroma or none at all. I think > that these beers could be penalized under the new system. Which beer styles have no aroma? > 3. The first sense to become overloaded is the sense of smell. Therefore > it is quite possible to make mistakes in a flight of 12 beers. Bill, you seem very hung up on how many mistakes are made in judging. I tend to agree with your analysis of the recipes in Zymurgy, and I don't know if those recipes are false or not, but I can tell you that I am very impressed with the judges I have been judging with around here (Bay area CA). I would like to ask you to submit a couple of beers to the World Cup of Beer next year and report on the forms you get back. I personally find that the perception of hop flavor and bitterness are the first to go for me and that my smell recovers in a few minutes. I would take a quick break in the middle of such a big flight, and I work on not "over-smelling" the beer when judging. > I agree with George I don't think that appearance should be changed from 6 > to 3. Leave it alone. This is by far the most common complaint about the sheet. > Jeremy Bergsman said>>> > but 7 is really the lowest I can go > on such a good beer. Flavor deserves at least 10 and I get > 8,6,10,4,7=35.<<< > > But the beer is not to style. Therefore the highest score it should > receive is a 24 under the old system. I didn't chime in on this debate before, but I don't believe that beers are in style or not. Most beers have a large number of characteristics. With maybe a small number of exceptions, any given characteristic of any given style does not have a step function where as the amount of that characteristic increases it becomes suddenly "in style" and then, as it increases still more it returns to "out of style." You like to complain about the OGs of the Zymurgy recipes. Sure, a 1.075 ESB has something wrong, but just because the AHA says that the OG should be 46-60 is it out of style at 61? Who said 60? I say 55. I'm a lot more concerned about all the ESBs over 57 than the difference between 60 and 61. Just what exactly is the algorithm for determining when a beer must get below 25? If a beer that scores 27 is in style, what separates it from a beer that scores 50? One improvement in the new scoresheet IMO is that the scoring guide is less strictly written and is more along the lines of, 'the lower your score the farther you are from the ideal of the style and the magic of a great beer'. > If the beer turned out to be a > Russian Imperial Stout wouldn't you look a bit foolish? Well, we'll find out since I put a sticker on all my scoresheets offering $1 to the entrant who sends me objective feedback about my judging. > Just because it is > a good beer doesn't mean it is to style. We are supposed to judge to > style. I don't think I disagreed with this except that I think there is some room on the sheet (i.e. the last section) to talk about how the beer works as a whole and how good it is. In other words, a perfect imperial stout is IMO very drinkable and so will not receive a 0 on this section from me even in the pilsener category. It will not receive a 10 because expectation and labelling are a big part of drinking and making beer respectively. > If we know the beer is out of style you can rest assured that it is > and probably more then we suspected. While I'm assured that my judging isn't perfect I'm working quite hard on it and I doubt that there were significant areas where this beer was out of style other than OG. Maybe the brewer is out there? "Houseman, David L" wrote: > Jerremy made a good point about usually scoring appearance between 3 and > 6 points. However, this is inclusive. That is the appearance scores of > 3, 4, 5 and 6 are the ones mostly used (I can't remember giving a 1 or > 2). That said, then the algorithm isn't to substract 3 but 2 points and > give appearance a range of 1-4. No, 0-3. If you want to give 1 free point, why not 3, or 15? > I did recently use a new score > sheet (AHA?) at the Brooklyn Brewing Company and in that rather than > having the "Color (2) Clarity (2) Head Retention (2)" it had something > to the affect "Excellent (6-5), Very Good (5-4), Good (4-3), Fair (2-1), > Poor (0-1)" and so forth for Aroma, Flavor, Body, and Overall This is not a new scoresheet, but (I believe) an unofficial one that has been around for a few years. > If not, is there a new AHA > and a new BJCP? I thought that the committee was working with the AHA > to ensure a single scoresheet? We are working together and the AHA has indicated that they will adopt what we come up with (presumably within reason). Jim Liddil wrote: > I do question the method by which it is being > "alpha tested" at this stage. I think it would have been a prudent thing > to have put the revised score sheet on an Internet site, possibly in pdf > and word format so that members of the BJCP could look at it and provide > comments. And RFC period if you will. This should have been done prior to > it being used in any competitions. I am NOT suggesting that the committee > be required to implement every suggestion that they get. We considered this but (as one can easily see) things can get very heated here very quickly. We shopped it around to a number of very experienced judges before it was used in the competition. Our concept was that every little change would receive a lot of criticism, with the people satisfied with the changes staying quiet as they usually do. A feedback form was passed out to judges who used the sheet in the competition in an effort to get feedback from everyone, not just those who were upset by it. I think that a lot of the changes may seem bad to people when they first see them, but if they think about the sheet and sit down and judge with it they will see the strength of the changes we have made. It is on a web site in pdf format and I hope the URL will be made public soon. - -- Jeremy Bergsman jeremybb at leland.stanford.edu http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~jeremybb ------------------------------ From: "Noel Blake" Date: Sat, 4 Apr 1998 21:45:45 -0800 Subject: New AHA Score Sheets I see a lot of positives in the new AHA score sheets. I believe the idea is to make the judges work harder to describe the beer and its flaws. In return, we have been given latitude to go outside the 20-40 points range without triggering thermonuclear war. It will be a lot harder to 'make up points' by inflating Appearance and Body, so go ahead and just give the beer what it deserves. Aroma is worth 12 points. Unless you have a clay palate, you can get quite a lot of information about a beer from its aroma. Each beer style should present its own aroma qualities, and some flaws are most apparent in the aroma. If you have sensory fatigue, or can't get a heinous aroma out of your system, take a short break and sniff some filtered water. Likewise, the change to replace the 'Body' category with the more inclusive 'Mouthfeel' should prevent this from being a no-brainer by making us think about body, carbonation, warmth, creaminess, and astringency. Once again, we'll have to work a little harder and think a little more. I do not agree with reducing Appearance to 3 points. As a judge, I routinely scored from 2 through 6, so I would like at least 4 points here. As a homebrewer, I can't help but feel cheated by this. If I make a perfectly clear, golden pilsener with nice Belgian lace clinging to the glass, should I only be rewarded by three points? This category has been reduced nearly to the status of a tiebreaker. Overall, I would give the new score sheets a 34. No, better make that a 36 - I've got more room to work with now. - - Noel Blake, Portland OR ------------------------------ From: David E Drinkwater-Lunn (David Drinkwater) Date: Sun, 5 Apr 1998 12:17:28 -0500 Subject: RE: points for appearance At 14:45 4/4/98, owner-judge-digest at synchro.com wrote: >------------------------------ > >From: "Bryan L. Gros" >Date: Fri, 03 Apr 1998 08:34:44 -0800 >Subject: points for appearance > >Jeremy wrote: >>When was the last time you gave a beer 2 or less for appearance? If you >>haven't done this what have been doing is scoring the beer between 3 and >>6 on appearance. Simply subtract 3 points from what you would have >>given on the old sheet and put down that score on the new sheet. Those >>3 points were just a "freebie" that were given to every beer. What is >>the point of that? Bryan agrees and goes on to say: ... >But the new question is how important is appearance for a beer? If a >beer is way too dark or light, is that a very minor point? Is appearance >only worth 6% of a score (3/50)? Or is 12% more appropriate? > >That said, I look forward to trying the new score sheets. I definately >favor expanding the "useable" range of scores by lowering the 19 >"low end" and changing the good and very good ranges. I wonder why >the California MCAB competition didn't use the new score sheets. I see this as a problem much like my lab grading from last quarter, but in reverse. I had only 10 points for overall "style" in grading. But I got so many papers that were so badly written that I couldn't adequately punish them with only 10 points. So I had to look for my deductions elsewhere. Not all that difficult. The "intro" would be just as disorganized (and often unreadable) as the rest of the paper, so I can shave off a few more points there. And the same would be true for the "results" section. So I find extra ways to take off points for a general problem by looking at the little bits and pieces of the paper. In the case of judging, we can turn this around and find extra points for a very specific problem in the more general categories. For example, for a beer that is way too light in color (say, looks like Amer Light Lager when it is entered as an Oktoberfest (or god forbid, as a stout), you can take away a few more points for overall impression. There are more than enough points there to allow us to reiterate the severity of a problem. And, if the color is way off, you can bet that certain other features of the beer won't match. A black pilsner is surely going to have some inappropriate burnt, roast, or chocolate character. D2 - -- David Drinkwater, drin0004 at tc.umn.edu, NetNick=Demodave, Homepage at http://www.tc.umn.edu/nlhome/m020/drin0004 Chilling in Minneapolis at the University of Minnesota Happy to hear from you! :-) ------------------------------ From: Randy Paul Date: Sun, 05 Apr 1998 22:22:27 -0400 Subject: score sheet request I'm not sure the improvements to be gained from the new sheets are as useful as having a consistent scale across competitions, but I'm willing to try them out. I have a request, however, that if you plan to use anything other than the scale-of-the-year, get a copy to the judges before the day of the event. It's hard to arrive at 9AM and immediately be consistent with a new form and a "calibration" beer. TIA -- Randy ------------------------------ From: Bill Giffin Date: Mon, 06 Apr 1998 08:31:23 -0400 Subject: Have we any money Top of the morning to yea all, Where has all the money gone? The BJCP received $10,000 from Boston Beer Co., has given a lot of exams at $50, and gotten a cut of all the money paid to have a competition. Have you seen a financial statement? Bill ------------------------------ End of judge-digest V1 #1564 **************************** Send subscription cancellations & changes to judge-request at synchro.com. Messages sent to the wrong address will be ignored.