The Great American Beer Festival

Tonight at the Great American Beer Festival in Denver Colorado they announced their yearly winners. The Great American Beer Festival (or GABF for short) started in 1982 and has been a staple event of the craft beer community, running every year (going virtual during the COVID – 19 pandemic). Making this the fortieth annual event.

For those unaware, The Great American Beer Festival, is thee annual event for craft breweries across the country. Every year, hundreds / thousands of breweries and brewers meet up in Colorado for the annual event, showcasing their goods, and hoping to bring home some of the illustrious medals. Getting a gold, silver, and even bronze at the GABF means a big deal to the brewer, and to the brewery itself.

It helps solidify yourself as a top brewery, it helps to get you recognition, and showcases the merits of the brewers involved.

Maryland

Maryland walked away with three medals this year: two silvers and one gold. Let’s take a look at who won what. Also, for a look at past year’s winners:

Past year’s winners:

• 2019 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania
• 2020 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania
• 2021 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania
• 2022 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania
• 2023 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania
• 2022 GABF Winners: Maryland
• 2023 GABF Winners: Maryland

Medalists and Winners

Maryland breweries received three medals this year at the Great American Beer Festival.

Gold

Category: Wood- and Barrel-Aged Strong Beer
Brewery: Rock Bottom Brewery – Bethesda
Beer: Rye Whiskey Barrel-Aged Atom Smasher
City: Bethesda, MD

Silver

Category: Sweet Stout or Cream Stout
Brewery: Waredaca Brewing Company
Beer: Milk Stout
City: Gaithersburg, MD

Category: Vienna-Style Lager
Brewery: Silver Branch Brewing Company
Beer: Oktoberfest
City: Silver Spring, MD

Congratulations

Congratulations to the Maryland breweries that medaled this year.

For more information on the competition, judging, and voting, you can go straight to the Great American Beer Festival’s page on ‘competition’: Great American Beer Festival – Competition.

Great American Beer Festival Wrap – Up

For more information, you can go to the Great American Beer Festival pages here:

• Great American Beer Festival – Homepage
• Great American Beer Festival – Competition, Judging Information, Etc.
• Great American Beer Festival – Awards Ceremony (With Livestream and Replay)
• Great American Beer Festival – Full List of 2023 Winners

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Another year is in the books for the Great American Beer Festival and last night they announced the winners for this year’s medals. Last night wrapped up the awards ceremony for the 2021 edition of the Great American Beer Festival. And as per usual, we here at The Beer Thrillers got you the list of Pennsylvania breweries that have won.

For those unaware, The Great American Beer Festival, is thee annual event for craft breweries across the country. Every year, hundreds / thousands of breweries and brewers meet up in Colorado for the annual event, showcasing their goods, and hoping to bring home some of the illustrious medals. Getting a gold, silver, and even bronze at the GABF means a big deal to the brewer, and to the brewery itself.

It helps solidify yourself as a top brewery, it helps to get you recognition, and showcases the merits of the brewers involved.

You can read past years award winners for Pennsylvania here:

• 2019 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania
• 2020 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania

I’ll break this article down by GOLD – SILVER – BRONZE, and then at the end list some statistics. Enjoy.

GOLD

Gold Medals:

Category: Brett Beer
Brewery: Cinderlands Brewing Co. – Foederhouse
Beer: Gregg

Category: Smoke Beer
Brewery: Neshaminy Creek Brewing Co.
Beer: Croydon is Burning

SILVER

SILVER MEDALS:

Category: Bock
Brewery: Attic Brewing
Beer: Unresolved

Category: Contemporary Gose
Brewery: Workhorse Brewing Co.
Beer: Prickly Pear Margarita

BRONZE

Bronze Medals:

Category: Brown Porter
Brewery: Dock Street Brewing
Beer: Man Full of Trouble

STATS

You can see a drop down menu of awards here: 2021 GABF Winners. And you can select it to several different filters.

This year there was a total of 5 Pennsylvania medalists, 2 gold, 2 silver, and 1 bronze. In 2020 there was 3 medalists, 1 gold, and 2 silver. In 2019 there was 7 medalists, 3 gold, 3 silver, and 1 bronze.

GABF Competition Statistics

• 35th edition of the GABF competition
• 9,680 beers judged
• 2,192 breweries in the competition from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico
• 170 judges
• Average number of competition beers entered in each category: 99.6
• Category with the highest number of entries: Juicy or Hazy India Pale Ale (427)
• 290 total medals awarded
• 265 medal-winning breweries
• 425 first-time GABF entrants
• 30 first-time entrant GABF medal winners

Looking Forward

Hopefully 2022 will see more medalists. 2021 was a step up (5 medalists this year) from last year (3 medalists), but still under 2019 (7 medalists). Hopefully 2022 will be better for Pennsylvania breweries.

Additional Links:

• Great American Beer Festival
• 2021 Great American Beer Festival – Winners Announced – Brewer’s Association
• 2021 Great American Beer Festival Coverage – Forbes
• 2020 Great American Beer Festival Winners – Pennsylvania
• 2019 Great American Beer Festival Winners – Pennsylvania

Thank you for visiting our blog. Please make sure to follow, bookmark, subscribe, and make sure to comment and leave feedback and like the blog posts you read. It will help us to better tailor the blog to you, the readers, likes and make this a better blog for everyone.

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2020 has been a challenging year (to say the least) for all kinds of events, conventions, brew fests, and other large beer related activities. Hell, Oktoberfest in Germany was cancelled this year. That alone should tell you everything you need to know about this year right there.

So the 2020 edition of GABF was not the normal (great) event it normally is. This year it went virtual (due to the pandemic) rather than being the fantastic event that brings in thousands of people and millions of gallons of beer to Colorado.

This was a rather lackluster year for awards in Pennsylvania as well. Sadly; this year, Pennsylvania only won three awards. One gold, and two silvers. Contrast that to last year’s seven awards won by Pennsylvania breweries (three gold, three silver, and one bronze). Hopefully 2021 will be a better year for Pennsylvania breweries (and not just in medalling at the GABF).

The results for Pennsylvania are below:

GOLD:

Category: Gluten-Free Beer
Brewery: Aurochs Brewing
Beer: Aurochs Hazy IPA

SILVER:

Category: English Mild or Bitter
Brewery: Wallenpaupack Brewing
Beer: English Pale Mild Ale

Category: English-Style Brown Ale
Brewery: Attic Brewing
Beer: Bloodhound Brown Ale

In 2019, Pennsylvania breweries that won included: New Trail Brewing Co, The Church Brew Works, 2SP Brewing, Free Will Brewing, Cellar Works Brewing, Swashbuckler Brewing Co, and Helltown Brewing Company.

You can read about the 2019 results here: 2019 GABF Winners: Pennsylvania.

For more information on the winners, of all of the different categories, you can read the Brewers Association press release on it, with a detailed analysis at the following link: Winners of 2020 Great American Beer Festival (Brewer’s Association Press). 272 medals were decided for 240 different breweries this year, which was the 34th edition of the event.

“Judges for the 34th edition of the celebrated competition evaluated 8,806 entries from 1,720 breweries from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C. Socially distanced judging took place in 35 sessions over 18 days with strict safety measures in place. The awards ceremony was held virtually on Friday evening, kicking off the two-day online programming portion of the Great American Beer Festival.  

“This year’s GABF competition may have looked a little different, but the beers entered into the competition were as impressive and innovative as ever,” said Chris Swersey, competition manager, Great American Beer Festival. “This has arguably been one of the most challenging years breweries have ever faced, so we hope these awards serve as a symbol not only of brewing excellence but also the resiliency of the craft brewing community as a whole.” (Brewer’s Association)

As per the above article, a quick run-down of statistics from the 2020 GABF Event:

GABF Competition Statistics

• 34th edition of the GABF competition  
• 8,806 beers judged 
• 1,720 breweries in the competition from all 50 states plus Washington, D.C. 
• 115 judges from 21 states 
• Average number of competition beers entered in each category: 97 
• Category with the highest number of entries: Juicy or Hazy India Pale Ale (377) 
• 272 total medals awarded  
• 240 medal-winning breweries  
• 337 first-time GABF entrants 
• 19 first-time GABF winners 

Sun King Brewery in Indianapolis, Indiana, won the most awards at this year’s event with 4 awards total. (One gold, and three bronzes.) In November, I am making a road trip out of Pennsylvania and through Western PA, Ohio, and into Indianapolis to visit the Vonnegut Museum and Library. I can definitely tell you that Sun King Brewery will be a stop for me at some point on that trip (they’ve been on my radar for quite a bit).

Cheers and here’s to hoping that 2021 is a much better year for our home state breweries in Pennsylvania. Let me know in the comments if you’ve tried any of the 2020 award winning beers. And check out the full article and let us know what you think of the results from around the country.

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Cheers!

-B. Kline