The winners of the Beer Lover’s Guide to Australia beer writing competition have been tallied and the winner is:
Nathan Costello from Victoria.
Nathan wins $500 and the pride of seeing his winning entry published in the 2011 Beer Lover’s Guide to Australia.

Judges normally say how close the results of these sorts of competitions and are rarely believed when they do. In this case and in a very strong field Nathan came out a clear winner with the judges. Though the judges were very divided over the remaining places with the minor places very tightly bunched on points.
Runners up:

2nd place (tie): Samuel Fletcher and Jennifer Davidson

4th place: Jenn Russell

5th place: James Davidson and Rory Bridges
The response to the competition was overwhelming with 17 entries and, without exception, they were a pleasure to read. The stories, many deeply personal, covered all aspects of beer travel and personal beer journeys. The winner, Nathan, is a good indication of where beer is at the moment having just discovered beer “about 18 months ago, but gotten right into it.”

Nathan, who works in IT, hasn’t been writing for long but recently began a blog calledUncle Frank’s Imperial Word Ale to share his thoughts on beer.

Beer Lover’s Guide publisher and competition judges, Tilo Grieco, was encouraged by the entries:

“It’s great to see such an interest in writing about the topic of beer and the personal journeys it inspires,” he said.

“We hope that as the Australian beer market diversifies it leads to more opportunities for writers. We are proud to have been able to have run the competition and are really excited at the quality of the entries. Nathan’s story will be a great addition to this year’s Beer Lover’s Guide.”

From my own point of view there were so many positives, chief amongst them was the number of aspiring female beer writers who wrote passionately about beer and whose stories do much to overturn stereotypes about beer and beer drinkers.

As I said when the competition was launched, if you look at the growth of wine in Australia, it has been accompanied — and in many cases driven — by the contingent of wine writers who share their passion for wine, educate the market, identify and interpret trends and generally fire the imagination of the public about wine.

The entrants in this competition were a wide mix of beer people from recent beer converts to long time brewers, all passionate about great beer and eager to share their passion. All we need now is more outlets for beer writing and more publishers, such as those behind the Beer Lovers Guide, willing to give them a platform to develop their craft and share their passion.

Australian Brews News will publish the runners-up’s stories over the next few weeks. Stay tuned for the release date of the Beer Lover’s Guide to Australia.

Thanks also to Pete Mitcham and James Smith for their assistance judging the competition.

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