Updated December 2025
The following rules, regulations, and judging procedures will be used at all IBA Sanctioned competitions. Ancillary categories or Peoples Choice categories may feature unique rules, provided by the event themselves.
IBA rules are designed to be fair and equal to all teams. Integrity of the Contestants, Judges, IBA Representatives, and Event Organizers is essential.
Team Requirements:
Unless otherwise organized, teams are responsible for their own electricity, water and removal of trash and ashes.
Before any cooking or food preparation can begin, all teams must:
- Present their meat for inspection by the IBA contest representative.
- Present a 10lb fire extinguisher that will remain in the teams cooking area.
- If using a charcoal or stick burner grill, team must present an ash/coals disposal bucket.
- Have completed a signed IBA event Waiver
- Be in compliance with all food handling and safety requirements and prepared for inspection by Central District Health. More info on these requirements can be found HERE.
Rules and regulations:
The decision and interpretation of competition rules & Regulations are at the discretion of event organizers and/or IBA representative. Their decisions and interpretations are final.
- Peoples choice and ancillary categories do not count towards the overall scores. They also do not count towards Team of the Year scores.
- Neither the IBA or event organizers will be responsible for any injury, loss or damage that may occur to the contestants or the contestant’s property from any cause whatsoever. It is the contestant’s responsibility to protect equipment and space so that no injury will result to the public, visitors, guests or persons or property.
- All competition meats shall be inspected by the IBA contest representative prior to cooking. The Event Organizer will determine meat inspection window. A member of the cooking team must be present during the meat inspection. Preperation (Including injecting, seasoning, marinading or cooking shall not begin until the competition meat has been inspected. All meat should be raw, and no pre-seasoned, brined, marinated or cured meat is allowed. Meat can be trimmed prior to arrival at the event. Once meat has been inspected, it must not leave the cooking site.
- Each team should consist of a “Chief cook” and up to three additional assistants. Chief cooks and assistants can only compete as part of one team, per event. Additional guests within the cooking area are welcome and are the responsibility of the competition team.
- Each team will be assigned a cooking space and must cook on site. Teams are responsible for bringing all equipment needed for preparation, safety, hygiene, cooking and serving. All equipment (including generators) must be contained within teams assigned cooking space.
- Contestants must adhere to all electrical, fire and other codes. Each team site must have a fire extinguisher.
- Meat shall be cooked using wood, wood pellets or charcoal. Gas and electric heat sources shall not be permitted for cooking or holding. Cookers that utilize wood for the heat source but run on electricity are permitted (eg Pellet Smokers). Fires shall not be built on the ground. Propane or other energy sources can be used for applications such as warming sauces. Parboiling, Sous-vide, and/or deep-frying competition meat is not allowed. Chicken may be cooked and served breaded. Searing meat with a gas torch is also prohibited. If any of the banned processes are discovered before the team turns in, the team will receive zeros. If discovered after turn-in, the team will receive a one (1) in all criteria for that entry.
- Ashes and grease must be disposed of by each team, prior to leaving. Team site will be left with no garbage, ashes, debris or liquid/grease spills. If site is not left in a clean manner the IBA will clean the site and bill the team for the expense involved.
- Unless otherwise indicated for the specific event, electricity and water will not be provided. Please plan accordingly.
- First aid is not required to be provided by event organizers. Please plan accordingly.
- Cancellation and Refunds – The IBA is a sanctioning body that works in partnership with event organizers. The IBA does not take any competition fees directly, instead the IBA receives a small sanctioning fee for each team. The only exception to this, is when the IBA allows event organizers to utilize it’s platform to take payment on their behalf. In these instances, the IBA operates only as a payment portal for the organizers. All refunds and cancellations are managed solely by event organizers.
Cleanliness & Food Safety
The following cleanliness and safety rules will apply:
- No use of any tobacco products while handling meat.
- Cleanliness of the cook, assistant cooks, cooking device(s) and the team’s assigned cooking space is required.
- Shirt and shoes are required to be worn.
- Sanitizing of work area should be implemented with the use of a bleach/water rinse (one cap/gallon of water). Each contestant will provide a separate container for washing, rinsing, and sanitizing of utensils.
- First aid is not required to be provided by the contest, except at the election of the contest organizer.
- Prior to cooking, meat must be maintained at 40° F or less.
- After cooking, all meat: Must be held at 140° F or above OR Cooked meat shall be cooled as follows: Within 2 hours from 140° F to 70° F and within 4 hours from 70° F to 41° F or less.
- Meat that is cooked, properly cooled, and later reheated for hot holding and serving shall be reheated so that all parts of the food reach a temperature of at least 165° F for a minimum of 15 seconds.
Contest Hand-ins
PORK RIBS: Ribs shall include the bone. Country style ribs are prohibited. Spare ribs, St Louis Style ribs and Baby Back ribs are all included.
CHICKEN: Chicken includes Cornish Game Hen and Kosher Chicken. Any part or combination of parts of the chicken can be utilized. Different chicken portions can be added into one box.
TRITIP:
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- Teams will submit six individual servings of each meat, per hand in box. Meat (Excluding ribs) can be submitted chopped, pulled, sliced or diced, as the cook sees fit. Ribs must be served bone in. Judges may not cut, slice, or shake apart to separate pieces. If there is not enough meat for each judge to sample, the shorted judge(s) will score a one (1) on all criteria, and the judges having samples will change the Appearance score to one (1) as a penalty.
- Portions should be of a similar size, but do not need to be the same cut of meat. Eg, a box could contain chicken flats and drumettes.
- Meat shall not be sculptured, branded, or presented in a way to make the team’s entry identifiable. Rosettes of meat slices are not allowed. Violations of this rule will be scored a one on all criteria by all six judges.
- Boxes CAN contain garnishes. If used, once determined to be legal, garnish plays no further role in the appearance score. When used, garnish is limited to chopped, sliced, shredded or whole leaves of fresh green lettuce, curly parsley, flat leaf parsley, curly green kale and/or cilantro. PROHIBITED GARNISHES ARE lettuce cores and other vegetation, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO endive, red tipped lettuce. “PROHIBITED” garnish shall receive a penalty score of one (1) on Appearance.
- Sauce is optional, but if used, shall be applied directly to the meat, and not pooled or puddled in the container (There is some exception for run off). No side sauce containers are permitted.
- sauce must not be “Chunky” with pieces no larger than 1/8 of an inch. Salsa, Gremolata, Chimichurri or similar “Chunky” sauces are prohibited.
- Entries will be submitted in an approved container, provided by the IBA contest representative. Tampering or marking containers will be cause for disqualification. Event organizers will provide replacement boxes if needed. Aluminum foil, toothpicks, skewers, foreign material, and/or stuffing are prohibited in the container. Marked entries or containers with the above listed material will receive a one (1) in all criteria from all Judges and be disqualified.
Causes for disqualification and eviction of a team, its members and/or guests:
- Disqualification and/or eviction of a team and its members/guests is at the sole discretion of event organizers and/or the IBA Representative.
Judging:
IBA sanctioning allows for blind judging only. Entries will be submitted in an approved numbered container provided by the contest organizer. The container may be re-numbered by the IBA Contest Rep or authorized personnel before being presented to the judges. Numbers have no correlation to the teams who submitted the box.
- Hand-in windows will be based on the timer managed by the IBA contest representative. Hand-ins submitted outside of the hand in window will not be judged and receive no score.
- Judging will be done by a team of between 5 & 6 persons at each judging table, who are at least 16 years of age. IBA Reps will determine the optimum number of tables of judges needed to properly judge the contest-Typically this means there will be a similar number of judges to number of teams.
- Only Judges, Contest Reps, approved support staff and approved Media Guests are allowed in the judging during the judging process.
- Family members of teams must advise the Reps/Judge Coordinator of their relationship with the participating team to avoid conflict and disappointment.
- Ranking of entries to determine a score is not allowed. Each entry should be judged on its own merit without comparison of other entries.
- The scoring system is all whole numbers inclusive of 9 through 2. A score of one is reserved for penalties or disqualifications and is only given when instructed by the IBA Contest Representative.
- A score of one will be given by all judges, in the appearance category for:
- Prohibited Garnish
- Pooled Sauce
- Less than 6 samples
A score of one will be given by all judges in all categories for:
- Sculpted meat
- Marked turn in container
- Foreign object in the container
- Wrong meat
An exception to this rule are small items that are NOT seen at the time of appearance scoring and are inside, underneath, or attached to one judge’s sample; for example, a small piece of foil. In this situation, the judge receiving the sample with the foil or foreign object will score the entry with a one in all categories. All other judges will score the entry as though there was no object in the box.
- When a judge or table captain finds what is potentially a foreign object in the turn-in container or on a piece of meat from the container, he or she shall immediately call an IBA Contest Representative to inspect and make a determination of the finding. A hair or brush bristle can be removed by the judge if he/she is willing to continue judging that sample without prejudice; a different sample may be taken if there are enough present in the entry box or a large sample(s) can be divided to assure all judges have enough for judging. If none of these can be done, the table captain or an alternate judge can be used to score the sample from which the hair or bristle was removed.
- The scores for each protein category are cumulative scores based on Appearance, Taste & Tenderness.
- In the event of lost, destroyed, or missing score cards the remaining score cards will be averaged in each category and those averages shall be used as the missing scores on replacement score cards.
- The weighting factors for the point system are:
- Appearance – .5600
- Taste – 2.2972
- Tenderness – 1.1428.
If an entry is judges by 6 judges, the lowest score is removed. If there is a tie in the category, dropped scores will be used to calculate the winner. If still tied, A coin toss will determine the winner of the category.
Cumulative points for all non-ancillary and Peoples Choice categories will determine the Grand Champion.
Total points per entry will determine the champion within each meat category.