Bear Republic Racer X

Brewed by Bear Republic Brewing Company
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Healdsburg, California USA

Serve in Snifter, Tulip

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On tap at Buckeye Beer Engine. This stuff is great. One of the best brews I’ve had in a long time. Muddy orange pour with a nice frothy head. The aroma was lots of caramel malt with the a perfect citrus scent. Great aroma. The mouthfeel is perfect in my opinion. Thick enough, but leaves you wanting to drink more and more. The taste is a fantastically balanced mix of sweet, caramel malt and a wonderful pine hop presence. Really flavorful and tasty stuff. If they bottled this I would buy it buy the truckload!

Shazaam! Killer beer. Having a tap of this very tasty beer at Bodega Brew Pub downtown La Crosse, Wisconsin USA. Poured with a great foamy, frothy huge light tan head. Plenty of lace. Nice dark honey amber color, slightly hazy. Nice nose - plenty of hops, piney, a bit of bread and citrus. Nice mouth. Not too much carbonation. Long bitter finsih complemented by some malty sweetness.

Pours a hazy, dark orange with enormous, creamy off-white head that sticks like spackle to the glass. I swear, I can still feel the head in y stomach. Good ol’ California IPA hop goodness aroma smacks your nose and gets the taste buds worked up. Grapefruit, pine, yadda yadda yadda. Flavors are to die for. Not too thick like a lot of IIPA’s are and is actually refreshing and crisp. This is a dangerous beer for the alcohol! Is it in there? I don’t know. Right up there with Dreadnaught, DFH 90 Minute and Big Eddy IIPA.

Growler served in a tulip. Beautiful hazy orange-amber pour with a medium off-white head. Good retention and sticky lacing. Full of hops: Citrus and pine resin aroma along with a little cereal and funk. Medium body, sticky-creamy texture, and good carbonation. Lightly sweet flavor of caramel that is quickly drowned out by the big time resiny, sticky, bitter finish. Perfect balance in this amazing brew. Maybe more hops than malts, but right in my wheelhouse. Racer X could be the best Double IPA I’ve ever had. Reminds me of White Knuckle.

Pours clear yellow with slight caramel hue. Medium head with good lacing. Aroma is pine, wet grass. Tastes of pine and grapefruit. Slightly bitter finish. Medium bodied. Phenominal!

UPDATED: APR 28, 2009 Third beer served at Naja’s IPA Fest. Just unbelievably good. Nose has sharp hops veiled behind orange peels and cream. A great fresh hop patina surrounds both aroma and flavor. Tastes like it smells, but brimming with bright hops with no afterburn. The rare dubs that has a hoppy sweetness (like a perfect cask IPA) but is also quite up front about hops. Creamy floral goodness that I could drink often.

UPDATED: APR 2, 2003 Bottle-RAF 2002 Wonderful citric, fruity, and hopsack aroma that I could smell all day. Attractive creamy head; extremely chewy hops. This is maxed out to the fullest. The absolute perfect Imperial IPA.

Draft at the brewpub. Hallelujah. Dark red, rusty and ruddy. Firm but thin head of white foam. Big rosy aroma. Syrupy. Almost mapley? This is a monster, full of chewy, rich malt, thick like there’s pine branches floating in it. Almost choclatey, it so robust!? Classic!! (#3399, 4/10/2008)

I had this on tap at the Capitol Ale House Innsbrook location. This came out with a deep amber body with about an inch off white foam on top. The head stayed around for a bit lacing the glass with rings foamy lace. As the glass was put in from of me I could smell the huge citric and floral aromas rising up and a strong pine scent. Surprisingly there was a slight fruity sweetness lurking about to tame the hops a bit. Taste was of strong citric hoppiness with underlying fruit notes. Quite an excellent smack of hops to the face with a refreshing sweetness keeping it from going overboard. A nice hoppy bitter aftertaste ended this awesome brew off. Great mouthfeel with a nice coating hoppiness and a creamy feel to it. This has awesome drinkability as I went through about 4 or 5 23 ounce glasses of this and still wanted more. I was surprised how much more balanced this was than I expected but it worked out nicely. This is one of the best double IPA’s out there it packs a strong hoppiness without completely shredding your palette. It listed this as 7.8% there not the 9%, I believe it was closer to 7.8% considering that I was still pretty functional after so many.

I had this one on tap at the Boulder Strong Ale festival 2005. What a treat this one was! It’s like they took Racer 5 and injected even more hops and flavor into it! This brew is nice and sticky. Bear Republic blows me away again! Even though this brew has a strong hop profile it still goes down quite smooth. I just wish this brew wasn’t so hard to come by!