What a match, what great brews, and what great rationale behind the voting. Our reviewers can spin it however they want but at the end of the day, SweepWater takes home the gold!

John: What a fitting match to wrap up the second tournament!  I can still see reasons why both of these brews deserve to be on top of the podium. At least we can all have comfort knowing that the “loser” today still walks with silver!   I’m voting for the SweetWater IPA. One of the primary deciding factors for me was its well-rounded nature and “anytime” drinkability.  Congrats to both beers today!

Brad: To me, today’s match isn’t voting for a winner because that would be nearly impossible, it’s just putting in order the top two beers in this tournament. And for me, the number one beer is the Sweetwater IPA because of its superior drinkability and broader appeal, combined with a fantastic taste and great overall beer experience. It feels good to have tournament #2 behind us and thanks to you, the fans, we couldn’t have done it without your record fan support!

Fans: You came out in droves and you came out for SweetWater mostly. The guess is that more of you identify with the beer you can snag at the bar with the game on, as you have come out en masse for this brew all tournament. Anyway, with a near 3:1 ratio, the SweetWater IPA takes him the gold with a 74%-26% victory. Thank you for voting early, voting often, and mainly coming back! Your support keeps us going and your voices are certainly being heard by the breweries!

Here we are, in the finals! Let’s jump right in with the SweetWater IPA, a beer that I have enjoyed all along, that a local pub near me just got on tap and basically cemented my business now, and a beer that I feel represented our blue-collar drinkers today. This beer is the ultimate bar beer as far as this tournament is concerned, its going to pair well with your greasy fried food, but it somehow also pairs well with grill food that isn’t overly greasy too. Equally as amazing is that this beer is packed full of flavor, so it stands well on its own. It was obviously the best IPA that we’ve had and that is saying something given the breadth of competition we had, and it has made it farther than any IPA has thus far, giving you an idea of how great this beer is. I don’t know if I would call this beer “classic” because it’s too down-to-earth for that. What SweetWater has done is made a bar beer, a party beer, a daily drinker; basically just a beer that you can enjoy any time any where and love it. This is the beer to have when you’re hanging out with your buddies or shooting pool, an uncommonly common IPA.

Like I said, we can’t get more different for two beers today. Here is a brew with an equally impressive resume, edging out our best Porter and  Bronze Medal Founder’s Porter as well as winning the European-style division and crushing the second-best beer from the same brewery, I must be talking about the Allagash Tripel. Where I wouldn’t call the SweetWater “classic” because it is too blue-collar, rich and classic are perfect words to describe the depth and fantastic flavor that the Allagash brings to the table. It’s a tough beer to call in a tournament like this because the seasoned quaffers will be able to enjoy and love the complexity of this beer, yet some newbies may be intimidated. I always hate to skew this tournament as to whom will like which beer, because I don’t know what everyone thinks, which is why this beer is here and has a shot at winning the whole thing. For newcomers, this is a great beer to step up your flavor sensing to the next level, because the flavors are very organic and easy to handle (versus some of the complex fruits of say, the Founder’s) so you get the richer flavors without the liquor or bitter notes that come with some other strong brews. Who will take home the gold? The down-to-earth and anytime deliciousness of SweetWater or the high-profile stylish Allagash Tripel? Your votes make the call and we can’t wait to see how it plays out!

UPDATE: Click Here for Match Results!

It seems like just yesterday we were anxiously awaiting the results of the first tournament, in order to see who would claim the first Brewlimination Gold medal.  Today, we get to see which beer will be the second to claim the gold.  It has been a long, hard-fought tournament, and has taken us since late December to reach where we are today.  Before I make my comments today, I first want to extend a huge thanks to everyone for your comments and voting efforts.  With the frequent disagreement between Brad and I, there’s not a chance we would have been able to narrow this field of 64 down to the final two beers without your help.

In the previous round, I said that The Allagash Tripel has a amazing taste profile and an easy-drinking nature.  Going all the way back to the first round, I remember saying how the strong nature of this beer is well-masked behind the complex and impressive flavor profile.  This beer does its style justice, and brings a wonderful 3-dimensional character to the table.  I mentioned in the early rounds how almost all of the Division 4 beers (and even styles) were somewhat new to me before this bracket started, and I have a new-found affection for these styles of beer more so now than ever.

The other beer on the table today is the SweetWater IPA, and while I didn’t vote for this beer in the Fermented Four, it’s easy to see why this beer still has a shot at the title.  This IPA packs a citrus punch and is loaded full of hops from start to finish.  A similarly amazing taste profile leads to a similar easy-drinking nature.  The kick of sweetness in the background helps to balance this brew out.  Again, this beer does its style justice, and while I’m only half-way through the glass I can tell this is shaping up to be one difficult match to call – quite fitting for a Championship bout.

Two delicious beers, two vastly different styles, to equally deserving competitors.  I can’t wait to see which one takes home the gold – stay tuned, and make sure to cast your final vote of the match!

UPDATE: Click Here for Match Results!

Founder’s Porter!  Congratulations to both beers today, as both are fantastic productions.  In the end, however, it seemed that the general consensus was in clear favor of the brew from Founder’s.  Here’s what we thought today:

John:  The Founder’s Porter tells a great story from start to finish, from the aroma to the taste to the finish.  When I think of a stylistic defintion of a porter, it’s difficult not to think of the porter from Founder’s.  And that’s why it earned my vote today.  The Terrapin Rye might be one of my new “favorite” beers from the entire bracket, but in the end I couldn’t find a reason to vote against Founder’s.  Both beers are fantastic, and I highly recommend both!

Brad: Today I will be going with the Founder’s Porter as I believe that this is the best “sophisticated beer” we have run across since the tournament’s inception, and it is deserving of a medal. The Terrapin is nice and a great brew to be sure, but up against the elite of the elite it simply was lacking anything that would make it stand out, especially against the Founder’s Porter which is almost unparalleled in terms of unique flavor and flavor complexity. Congrats to both breweries for making it this far, you both deserve hardware but only one will get it!

Fans: In keeping with what seemed to be a common trend for this second bracket, the margin of victory was close to two-to-one.  The final tally was 68% in favor of the Founder’s Porter!

This tournament’s first medal matchup is a battle of two very strong and consistent brews. Both of these beers lost by a hair in my opinion and were more than worthy of moving on. Let’s take a look at exactly what made these brews stand out in the earlier rounds:

First, the Terrapin Rye Pale Ale was a beer noted for its consistency. But lost in that praise somehow were the remarkable flavors. After all, if a beer is consistently bad, well that doesn’t make the ultimate brew does it? The Rye Pale is a great example of both styles of beer with its malty caramel and brown sugar notes that are tempered by the pale hop spices that keep this beer grounded and give it a very natural flavor. The mouthfeel itself seemed to be dominated by the malts as it was very smooth and not so much carbonated, which I think is refreshing for a pale and much better than a lot of over carbonated laziness that is out there. That’s great, but what really sets this beer apart as a legitimate Fermented Four threat? That would have to be what I assume was a very methodical selection by the brewmasters because not only do the flavors embody their genre, they are very pronounced. That is to say you can taste all of the flavors that I have mentioned very easily. With a lot of beers the flavors just mush together and you are left searching for flavors because it is hard to tell where the malt ends and the hops begin. This beer is truly great because of the strength of the flavors. Not to mention that all of these well-selected flavors pair well with almost any food as well as by themselves to make a beer you can have anywhere, any time and you will not be disappointed.

Unfortunately for the Terp, it faces another beer with great and well-pronounced flavors for the bronze, the Founder’s Porter. The Porter may present the strength of flavor that the Terrapin has, but the Porter has a great many more strong flavors. As has come to be my usual warning, if you do not decant this beer, it will taste like root beer, so let it breathe for a minute before drinking. When you let it breathe this beer opens up to rich fruit sugars, and incredible hop flavors that I can’t place over the deep fruit flavors but it is noticeable that they are there. What got this beer to the Fermented Four were those rich flavors, and a uniqueness of both flavor and overall feel that made it the best porter/stout we had selected. It’s main problem comes in the pairing with food, although it is not as big of a hang-up as I had originally made it out to be. This is a relaxing and laid-back beer once you get over that the initial taste is going to be powerful. This may be the most complex beer in the tournament, and I’m certain my words don’t do it justice, so drink today’s matchup and let us know what you think, you’ll begin to understand the complexity.

UPDATE: Click Here for Match Results!

Sorry for the delay in posting action, we’re so used to holding the suspense of our winner posts until around 4 that I forgot there was really no reason to pause today. We have our winner and it is Southern Tier Phin & Matt’s Extraordinary Ale!!!! Only having one beer in the tournament didn’t matter for these guys as they really made it count. Before we break down the fan voting that put them on top, let’s get to what our reviewers thought today:

John: Well folks, it’s all said and done. The first bracket is in the books. Who do I pick for my choice for gold medal winner, you ask?  Well, I have the luxury of not having to pick. Both of these beers deserve it in my book, I’m just glad that the worst case scenario for either is a silver medal. Congrats to both breweries, and if you haven’t tried either of these yet, please, do so immediately, for your own sake!

Brad: Thank you all for the immense outpouring of support. Considering this whole thing was just a spark of an idea 6 months ago, its amazing to believe we’ve gotten the support we have. Well, actually, Smuttynose and Southern Tier got the support, we just counted it up. It’s so difficult to say what I would have picked and I don’t want to ramble on and on, especially because it doesn’t matter, but I think if I had to pick I’d have gone with Phin & Matt’s. The Old Brown Dog is incredible but I just couldn’t find a reason to vote against the Extraordinary Ale so, there you have it.

Fans: What can we say other than thank you! You truly made this a great tournament with all of your suggestions, comments (though they were on Facebook, we need to get some trash talking on this site next time around), and support of your favorite beers. Speaking of your favorite beers, two of the best competed today and as of this morning it was almost dead even. Rallies from both sides for the past week lead to the crowning of the eventual winner, Southern Tier Phin & Matt’s Extraordinary Ale!!! by a margin of 54%-46%, though less than 100 votes separated the two until shortly after noon today.

Congrats again to Southern Tier Brewing Co. We look forward to seeing you in future runs of the tournament. Keep an eye out at your brewery as we will be presenting you with a gold medal award of some kind once we get it made.

And of course, thank you to the folks at Smuttynose, who will win my outstanding brewery award for having two beers that I honestly thought were going to square off in the finals for awhile. You guys do a fantastic job and we know for sure you will be back next time with a vengeance!

To the fans: Again, thank you for everything! We aren’t done yet. As we work diligently over the next few weeks to improve the site and the tournament as a whole, your feedback will be critical to the process. Our beer polls will be replaced with some random questions about the tournament, feel free to answer them to help us out so that the next tournament can be bigger and better. Suggestions@brewlimination.com is open to receive any ideas, the two biggest suggestions so far have been a bracket and a contest with prizes for the winners and a message board to get out the trash talking.

Also, keep an eye out for our Special Award Winners, some fun things we are going to give out to some beers that may never have gotten off the ground that still deserve some recognition.

Thank you all so much for everything and keep stopping by. Will Southern Tier be able to defend the title? Or will the Old Brown Dog and Star Island Single Sneak by? What about the Yeti still lurking in the Bronze, and a host of other beers that were ousted early on? We’ll be back soon with so stick around!

Fortunately for John and I, we do not have to choose today. When we started the tournament we put a voting threshold in the rules that stated if a certain number of votes was ever reached for a matchup, out votes at the end of the day would become null and, although we will do the winner post, the only thing that will decide the match is the fan vote. The reason for that is we didn’t want to both accidentally pick the beer that received thousands of fan votes and essentially screw everyone over, so just wanted to get that out of the way.

Alright! For those of you tense and awaiting my review of these two, here we go. A case of beer and a Facebook video are on the line, but many of you probably know that coming from those respective sites… Where to start? What to say? I have my little talking points but it all seems so moot in the midst of all the excitement. I’m going to review them simultaneously today so as to avoid giving anyone top billing. If you want background info on the Southern Tier Phin & Matt’s Extraordinary Ale, check here and the subsequent links. If you wanna see my thoughts on the Smuttynose Old Brown Dog Ale, here would be where to direct your attention. It becomes so tough to compare the two because anything you could say about one could almost easily be said about the other. I’d say in terms of hoppy spiciness, Phin & Matt’s has the edge as their malted aromas do hit first but ultimately seem complimentary to the hoppy floral and spice flavors that lead to the finish. Besides, the Old Brown Dog takes the malted cake, with delicious sweet flavors that are delicious without blowing you away in terms of sweetness.

In a way I wish I could vote today, but I’m glad I don’t have to. How do you pick between these two brews that are just good? Today the theme would have to be the overall picture I’d think, the most completely awesome beer in the tournament will be decided. Who would drink this beer? When would they drink it? What would they drink it with? Who would they drink it with? How would they drink it, out of the bottle or a snifter, remy martin-style? I’ll do my best to address these a little later on but it’ll be tough as the answers will sound the same. Best of luck to both breweries today! I’m eager to see how it turns out! It’s noon and still close…

Just taking a look at today’s match it would seem that some of you were slighted by these beers ending up in the bronze medal match, because voting was down a little bit, but fortunately the breweries managed to rally some support and get the votes out, but sadly for the folks at Troegs, they will have the beer that takes home nothing but a #1 seed in the next tournament. Here’s how things shook out today:

John: I really wish that both of these beers could walk away having placed, after all we all know they both deserve it. But, the fact is that a decision must be made, and today I’m deciding in favor of the Great Divide Yeti Imperial Stout, and here’s why: when we started Brewlimination, I liked stouts, but was never a huge fan. Now, not only do I like stouts, I find myself craving them. Especially the Yeti. And that’s why it gets my vote today. Congrats to both of these beers, and if either/both are still new to you, I highly recommend giving them a try!

Brad: I feel like I’ve reviewed both of these beers about as much as I could, and this morning’s review didn’t feel could because I couldn’t come up with much interesting to say, so that said I’ll stick to the point today. I was almost positive the Yeti would make the finals, and that it had a more than decent shot of winning. Yeah, the balance is a bit of an issue but its like anything else, excellence in one category can outweigh an issue in another sometimes. Since today is the start of the NBA season, it’s like if someone makes 80% of their 3-pointers, but they can’t make a layup… I think they get a pass on their shortfall. The malted deliciousness of the Great Divide Yeti Imperial Stout vastly overpowers any weakness it has, and propels it to my vote today. I do love the Troegs HopBack Amber Ale, but its loss to Phin & Matt’s really killed a lot of its momentum as it was exposed as the second-best ale of the final four. This beer will come back and maybe with a bit more support from Troegs and our finely honed reviewing skills it can snatch a trophy from the next battle!

Fans: The fan vote today was not a big surprise. The people at Great Divide do a great job of getting out the vote as well they should because they have an incredible brew. Today was no exception as the fantastic Great Divide Yeti Imperial Stout took the victory by a near 2-1 victory, winning 64%-36%. The voting for the gold medal match is a few hundred away from the threshold that will disqualify our reviewers and give the gold medal decision to you and you alone! So vote as much as you can!

Well, after 5 previous rounds, both of these beers have gone a long way to make it to the bronze medal match-up.  As such, I feel that there is little more I can say regarding both of these beers which I haven’t already mentioned.  Let’s face it – these two beers are quality beers, otherwise they wouldn’t still be in the tournament.   Of course, that also means that either one of these beers could easily walk away with a victory in this match.

So, how to pick a winner?  Which one of this pair of brews is truly a better example of its style and a more complete all-around package?  The Great Divide Yeti Imperial Stout is a powerhouse – it will make certain that you remember it for next time, a fantastic quality in a beer.  The folks at Great Divide do the style justice with the Yeti – which makes it difficult to vote against.

However, the Troegs HopBack Amber Ale is right in the same boat.  Coming off as more balanced in comparison to the Yeti, the HopBack is a great anytime beer that goes down easy.  I’ve already said that the Troegs brew is “smooth and well-rounded,” which makes this beer equally difficult to vote against.

To make my decision in this match, I think I’ll be going all the way back to the beginning – looking at just why and how each of these beers handled their previous opponents.  Remember, voting will remain open until 3PM, with the match winner announced shortly afterward!

So, the bronze medal match. I’ve never been a huge fan of consolation matches, even though I see the reason for it today, as anyone could easily make the argument that these beers could be sitting pretty in the final. Let’s not dwell on the past, but get to this match and who will be walking away with a medal, and who will be walking away with nothing but our best wishes and a #1 seed in the next incarnation of the tournament.

The first brew I want to review today is the Great Divide Yeti Imperial Stout, since I was of the opinion that it should be in the final. We know what this beer is, the ultimate dessert beer, chocolate and delicious. So what got it here? Fan vote for one, although we had a record breaking number of votes that day, and its limitations caused its downfall. I’m personally of the impression that this beer is difficult to vote against, considering that this beer is the ultimate after dinner and arguably solo beer. The question is, how does it stack up in terms of balance against the Troegs HopBack Amber, and that is the only place that it really stumbles against this other beer. I want to keep today’s review simple because I want you all to decide for yourselves, and leave a majority of my review to the decision. After having my last Yeti for the tournament, I think that it will be an issue of best-of-breed versus balance, and whether or not a balanced beer of the highest quality can beat a best of breed that lacks total balance.

That brings me to a hoppy but balanced beer that ran into a buzzsaw and ended up here, the Troegs HopBack Amber Ale. The major advantage this beer has over its opponent is its balance, yet it is clearly not a best of breed as it had a little difficulty in the Fermented Four against a similar category beer. If you check out the previous reviews you can see that this beer is very well-balanced with a slight malted beginning that progresses to a strong hoppy flavor as the beer empties. Truly an exceptional beer from a great brewery, the problem is that it lost to a beer of higher quality and similar genre in the previous round, leaving it exposed as a well-rounded and classic beer, but it isn’t a best of breed. Do we want to reward two Ale’s in the medal count, especially when one got swept by the other in the round prior? I don’t think we can take that into consideration, but that it will fall into the same predicament that I mentioned before: Is a well-rounded 2nd-of-breed better than a classic beer that could be considered one of the best beers to ever be made?