Colorado GABF Winners & Award Ceremony Highlights

The 2017 Great American Beer Festival (GABF) competition concluded on Saturday. The ceremony awarded 293 gold, silver and bronze medals to some of the best commercial breweries in the United States, plus 3 GABF Pro-Am teams of homebrewers & professionals. Colorado breweries claimed 38 of these medals, maintaining the same medal count as they’ve had the previous two years. In a competition that saw a total of 7,923 entries from 2,217 breweries, maintaining 38 is an accomplishment worth celebrating. Only California took home more medals, with a total of 57.

In addition to all the winning, this year’s award ceremony was full of surprises and first. Read on for our highlights of the GABF awards and see which local breweries took home some GABF hardware.

2017 GABF Award Ceremony Highlights

Ryan Wibby’s Winning Proposal

Longmont’s Wibby Brewing took the silver medal in the Munich-Style Dunkel category for their Moondoor Dunkel, but that’s not what the most memorable part of their time on the GABF stage. While accepting their award, Ryan Wibby took a knee to propose to his girlfriend, Robin. She said yes, thank goodness, and the room erupted in cheers for the happy couple.

Elaia the Brewery Cat Takes the Stage

When Golden’s New Terrain Brewing accepted a silver medal in the Belgian-Style Witbier category for their beer Suntrip, an especially fuzzy guest joined them on stage – and no, this is not a beard joke. Elaia the brewery cat joined in the celebration when one of her humans, Michael Roberts of New Terrain, went up to accept their medal. It only seems fitting, since Elaia loves to tag along for brewery adventures. When we met her later in the GABF session, she seemed sweet and calm as ever, so clearly, her moment of GABF fame hasn’t gone to her head.

Lone Tree Brewing Wins Big

Lone Tree Brewing Company has much to celebrate! The brewery took home their first-ever gold for their Mexican Lager, which came out on top of the American-Style Lager or Malt Liquor category. This is huge, considering a gold in this category hasn’t been won by an independent brewery in over 15 years, instead usually going to the likes of Pabst, Coors or Miller. If that wasn’t enough, Lone Tree Brewing is also the only Colorado brewery to win multiple medals this at GABF this year. They also claimed a silver in the Imperial Red Ale category for their Hop Zombie. Well done, LTBC!

Cheers to First-Time Colorado GABF Winners

Of the 38 medals handed out in our state, 10 went to first-time winners. Since we know your first time is always special, we wanted to offer a special congrats to the breweries who won their first GABF medals this year. We hope this is the first of many! Congratulations to: 105 West Brewing Company, Cellar West Artisan Ales, CO-Brew, Copper Club Brewing, Finkel & Garf Brewing Co, Jessup Farm Barrel House, Launch Pad Brewing, Little Machine Beer, New Terrain Brewing, and Square Peg Brewerks. Someone go buy these winners a chicken dinner!

Colorado Sweeps the Pro-Am

Colorado homebrewers took all three Pro-Am category medals. The Pro-Am pairs American Homebrewer Association competition winners with professional brewers, who scale up their homebrew recipe for entry into GABF. Doug Thiel and Denver Beer Company took home the Pro-Am gold, while silver went to Daniel Tomkins and Black Bottle Brewery, and Mark Boelman and Odell Brewing took home the bronze.

No Sour Feelings?

The only GABF medal not awarded this year was the gold medal for the fruited American-style sour ale category. Even with 105 entries, the judges did not choose a gold medal winner. Based on their guidelines this means that they did not feel any of the entries were world-class beers that accurately exemplified the style with a proper balance of taste, aroma, and appearance. Fortunately, Colorado sour beers did better in other categories. Castle Rock’s Rockyard Brewing earned a gold medal in the Wood- and Barrel-Aged Sour Beer category for their Plum Creek Sour. Loveland Aleworks earned a bronze in the same category for their 5th Anniversary Tequila Sour. Baere Brewing Co won bronze for their Blackberry Table Sour in the Berliner-Style Weisse category.

Colorado GABF Winners: Full List

Below is a full list of our Colorado GABF winners. Congratulations to all the Colorado breweries who took home some GABF bling this year!

Medal	GABF Category	Brewery Name	Beer Name	Brewery Location
Gold	English-Style India Pale Ale	CooperSmith's Pub & Brewing	Punjabi	Fort Collins
Gold	American-Style Amber/Red Ale	Copper Club Brewing Co	F-Town Amber	Fruita
Gold	Pro-Am	Denver Beer Co	Just Another Pretty Face	Denver
Gold	Sweet Stout or Cream Stout	Finkel & Garf Brewing Co	Oatmeal Milk Stout	Boulder
Gold	Classic Saison	Funkwerks	Saison	Fort Collins
Gold	South German-Style Hefeweizen	Gordon Biersch Brewery	Hefeweizen	Broomfield
Gold	Brett Beer	Jessup Farm Barrel House	Fancy Pants	Fort Collins
Gold	American-Style Fruit Beer	Little Machine Beer	Razz Against the Machine	Denver
Gold	American-Style Lager or Malt Liquor	Lone Tree Brewing Co	Mexican Lager	Lone Tree
Gold	Wood- and Barrel-Aged Sour Beer	Rockyard American Grill & Brewing Co	Plum Creek Sour	Castle Rock
Gold	Historical Beer	Square Peg Brewerks	Waverly Tulip	Alamosa
Gold	Smoke Beer	The Sandlot Brewery at Coors Field	So long and thank's for all the (smoked) fish!	Denver
Gold	Wood- and Barrel-Aged Strong Stout	WeldWerks Brewing Co	Medianoche	Greeley
Gold	Mixed-Culture Brett Beer	Wiley Roots Brewing Co	Galaxy Dry Hopped Funk Yo Couch	Greeley
Silver	American-Style Wheat Beer	105 West Brewing Co	Lemon Rye	Castle Rock
Silver	Pro-Am	Black Bottle Brewery	Lichtenhainer	Fort Collins
Silver	Experimental Beer	Black Project Spontaneous & Wild Ales	Roswell: Grudge	Denver
Silver	American-Style Black Ale	Cannonball Creek Brewing Co	Black 28	Golden
Silver	Specialty Saison	Cellar West Artisan Ales	Make Hay	Boulder
Silver	German-Style Pilsener	Dry Dock Brewing Co South Dock	Pilsner	Aurora
Silver	Historical Beer	Ironworks Brewery & Pub	Hilltopper's Pride Kentucky Common Ale	Lakewood
Silver	Session Beer	Launch Pad Brewery	Peacekeeper	Aurora
Silver	Imperial Red Ale	Lone Tree Brewing Co	Hop Zombie	Lone Tree
Silver	Belgian-Style Witbier	New Terrain Brewing Co	Suntrip	Golden
Silver	Wood- and Barrel-Aged Strong Beer	Odyssey Beerwerks	Woods Monk	Arvada
Silver	Brett Beer	Our Mutual Friend Brewing	Saison Trystero	Denver
Silver	Session India Pale Ale	Twisted Pine Brewing Co	Patio Pounder	Boulder
Silver	Munich-Style Dunkel or European-Style Dark Lager	Wibby Brewing	Moondoor Dunkel	Longmont
Bronze	Berliner-Style Weisse	Baere Brewing Co	Blackberry Table Sour	Denver
Bronze	Bock	Breckenridge Brewery	Mountain Series: Maibock	Littleton
Bronze	Herb and Spice Beer	Broken Plow Brewery	India Spring Honey Cream Ale	Greeley
Bronze	Wood- and Barrel-Aged Beer	Bull & Bush Brewery	Woody Pils	Denver
Bronze	Specialty Saison	CO-Brew	Farmhouse Saison	Denver
Bronze	German-Style Koelsch	Elk Mountain Brewing Co	Downhill Kölsch	Parker
Bronze	German-Style Altbier	Grimm Brothers Brewhouse	Little Red Cap	Loveland
Bronze	Wood- and Barrel-Aged Sour Beer	Loveland Aleworks	5th Anniversary Tequila Sour	Loveland
Bronze	Pro-Am	Odell Brewing Co.	Eluxansis	Fort Collins
Bronze	Munich-Style Dunkel or European-Style Dark Lager	Pug Ryan's Brewing Co	Dunkel	Dillon

More GABF Competition Results

Want to see what other states won awards in this year’s GABF beer competition?  View the 2017 winners or download a PDF list of the winners to see all the results.

Cheers to all the breweries who competed. You’re all winners to us!