For the second year in a row, Pennsylvania took home 12 medals from the Great American Beer Festival. Of those medals, five were gold, two were silver and five were bronze.

This year’s big winners taking home golds were Earth - Bread + Brewery for Perkuno’s Hammer in Baltic-Style Porter, Sly Fox for Grisette in Belgian- and French-Style Ale, Victory for Golden Monkey in Belgian-Style Tripel, Tröegs for Troegenator in Bock and Fegley’s for Arctic Alchemy in Old Ale or Strong Ale.

Congratulations also go out to Barren Hill, Triumph Brewing New Hope, Iron Hill Media, Yards and Four Seasons Brewing for bringing home medals as well.

Overall, the Brewers Association awarded 268 medals in 90 categories at this year’s Great American Beer Festival. This year, total entries reached 5,507, an increase of about 16%. It took 222 judges from 10 countries to choose the winners. It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.

For 12 years running now, the most-entered category is and was again American-Style India Pale Ale (IPA), which had 279 different brews vying for a medal. This year’s second-most popular category was the broad Herb and Spice Beer (150 entries), followed by the American-Style Pale Ale (145 entries). Breweries continue to step up their game, which was proven by a four-way tie between 10 Barrel Brewing, Barley Brown’s Brew Pub, Devil’s Backbone, and Left Hand Brewing for most medals won (each taking home three).

Interestingly, there were two categories in which not all medals were awarded: no gold in Golden or Blonde Ale and no silver given in English-Style Brown Ale.

Photo © Brewers Association