Last year fellow beer writer Greg Kitsock conducted a March Madness bracket for beer in the Washington Post, calling it Beer Madness. It was a brilliant idea and I vowed to do my own this year (and I still may). The Post will be doing another one again this year, and over 400 hopeful judges submitted applications including “inspired limericks, hopeful haikus, reasoned arguments and, yes, desperate pleas.” Judges are expected to be announced shortly and the beers for this years contest should likewise one upcoming Sunday soon. I’ll follow along like I did last year.
In the meantime, Great Lakes Brewing News, has announced their own contest involving India Pale Ales, the National IPA Contest, or NIPAC. It may not roll off the tongue like N-C-Double-A but I’ll wager it’s a damn side tastier on your tongue. They’ve chosen 32 IPAs from around the country and over four separate rounds will have three brewers judge each head-to-head competition to determine who moves on toward the championship.
To participate you need to register online (it’s free) and then after receiving your password via e-mail vote for who you think will win each of the sixteen contests in round one. You simply choose who you think will win each head-to-head contest of IPAs. You can even win some prizes, which, according to the website rules will “include a full case of beer from the 2008 National IPA Champion, tee-shirts, posters and brewery merchandise.” The schedule of rounds is below. Get picking.
- Round 1: February 23rd
- Round 2: March 1st
- Round 3: March 5th
- Championship Rounds: March 8th
What fun! Now I need to get off my arse and figure out something different from the other two contests. Anybody have any thoughts or ideas?