Bear Republic Racer X

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 6 | Flavor: 7 | Overall: 9

Bottle - Big frothy head. Body color of an bright orange sunset. Brilliantly clear. Some carbonation coming from bottom of glass. Distinctly pine resin aroma. Like fresh pine needles. What’s interesting is when you compare its aroma side-by-side with Racer 5, it makes R5 smell somewhat malty. Little bit of orange flavor behind the hops. Hops linger on the palate for quite some time. If you like hops this is AMAZING!! If you hate hops, or brews with bushels of hops, don’t get this one. You’ll be sorry! ;-)

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

22oz bottle shared by Doug
Appearance: Clear amber with a big off-white head and good lacing
Aroma: Tropical fruit and pine resin
Taste: Piney, caramel, malty and herbal
Very nice and tasty, easy drinking for sure.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 8

Courtesy of tpd975. Pours hazy copper with gold edges and thin off white head. The aroma emits pine, earthiness, spicy hops and grapefruit. The aroma is smooth all hoppy goodness. The taste is a bit hoppy to start with grapefruit citrusy notes mixing with a bit of lemon and nearly rich sweet malts creating a very nice sensation of yum. The flavor stays like this and pretty even heading toward the finish where a dash of roastiness and growing grapefruit and spice hoppiness take it to closure.

Aroma: 10 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

22 oz bottle. Pours slightly hazy reddish gold with a medium creamy off white head that retains well and laces the glass.

The aroma is sweet caramel malt, fruits and piney resiny hops.

The flavor is sweet caramel malt with fruity, resiny, piney hops that are quite bitter and some residual alcohol. The mouthfeel is medium to full bodied with smooth carbonation.

Overall, an excellent hop bomb of a DIPA.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

Pours a medium coppery amber with a one finger off-white head with good retention and lacing. Aroma of grapefruit, citrus and light pine hops and bready malt. Flavor follows with remarkably well integrated malt, citrus and citrus hops. Finishes with citrus rind and herbal hops. While not quite as intense hops as many Western IIPAs, the flavors are so well balanced that this is a pleasure to drink. Medium bodied with a pleasant creaminess.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 9 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

A damn good beer. The bottle I had was about a year old...and it was still great. I wasn't expecting the aroma and flavour to be as complex and full as they were. A nice golden brown with plenty of hops in the mix. The citrusy flavours came through in the end.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 9 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

Man...another great entry into the bdl ipa style. this one's big all around, with a great piney nose, nice body, heavy flavors of hops and malt, and a dry bitter finish. You'll want another.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

Yet another great beer from the stable of Bear Republic. It seems that whatever these guys touch is gold. This DIPA is one friggin' excellent beer. The color is a deep amber/reddish color with a nice off-white head. Aroma is moderately sweet, high on the hop character with graperuits and pines abound. Mouthfeel is smooth, slightly thick with a light feel. Flavor is piney, yes, mostly citrus but this is a rare breed of DIPA where the hoppyness doesn't wear down the taste buds. This seems incredibly sessionable (if a DIPA were ever to be sessionable). Good stuff!

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 10 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

Boy... this is easily one of my favorite beers, let alone IIPAs. I have only seen this at the brewry, and just had one there a few days ago. Has a great hop aroma and flavor. It has that piney fruity smell/taste of fresh hops through and through. Tasty beer for sure.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 10 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

As my buddy Richard has said in the past, this is the fairly rarely seen big brother of Racer 5 -- an IPA that I used to worship, and even now still respect very much. But if I can get a hold of a pint of Racer X, all is right in the world! :)

A little dark and mysteriously murky for an IPA -- or is that just because it came from a firkin? Either way, looks don't mean a damn thing compared to the rest of the package, when it comes to this beer!

If a blind person has their remaining senses compensating for the lack of sight, then this beer's aroma might blow away their sense in the same way that their eyesight has been lost! Huge malty/hoppy aroma, that literally jumps out the glass and runs across the table, scaring other beers into submission! That might be a bit of an exageration, but this beer's aroma does make a hugely favorable impression.

After the massive nose, this beer's flavor profile has some big shoes to fill -- and does a great job doing so. I think that this probably about as bitter (or perhaps a hair more so) than the Racer 5. But the Racer X's strong-point is the bigger-n'-badder malt profile. Not so much as to make this into a Barleywine, but surely enough to push this into the "Imperial/Double IPA" quasi-category.

A really great beer that I always look forward to each and every San Diego Real Ale and Strong Ale `Fest....!
//TB

P.S. A buddy of mine knows the headbrewer at Bear Republic, and was able to sqeeze out the details of the Racer beers. With that sort of hard data in-hand, I forsee me making a batch of "Eraser 5" or "Eraser X" in the near future...! :)

P.S. S. http://www.bnrmetal.com/groups/racx.htm