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Bourbon Games Episode 3: Florida Wins Skeet and Matt Madness by a Single Point
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Last Updated on September 7, 2026 by Justin Jones
BOURBON GAMES · SEASON 1 · EPISODE 3
Florida takes both challenges by a single point
Team Florida won the skeet shooting challenge 11 clays to 10 and the Matt Madness blind nosing and tasting battle 14 points to 13, squaring the Bourbon Games at two challenges apiece with only the final blend left to decide the competition. Gary Penna and Justin Mills went 10 for 12 with two shooters. Florida needed both of its last two shots and got them. Matt Porter, Barrel King’s own Chief Tasting Officer, then scored both teams through eight blind questions and separated them by a point.
Episode 3 recap. Contains results from Episodes 1 through 3 only. The final blend had not been judged when this episode ended.
Two competitions, two one-point margins
Episode 3 is the tightest hour of the Bourbon Games so far. Both scored challenges came down to a single point, and both went to Florida. That is what erases the lead Arkansas built in the first two episodes and sends the series into the final day level.
Skeet: one clay
Florida trailed 9 to 10 with two shots left in the final round and hit both.
Matt Madness: one point
Across eight blind questions the teams separated by a single point, 14 to 13.
Skeet shooting at the top of the hill
Host Kaynon opened the episode by walking the teams up the hill before any blending began. Each team was given a double-barrel shotgun holding two shells at a time, with a grand total of six shots per competitor. Most clays hit wins, and that was the whole rule set.
The arithmetic favored Florida from the start. With a full team of three they had 18 shots. Arkansas, down a competitor for the entire competition, had 12. Kaynon named that openly as Florida’s advantage and Arkansas’s disadvantage on the day.
Reading the on-screen grid
The episode’s score graphic is a hit and miss grid, one row per competitor at six cells each. Florida gets three rows for 18 shots and Arkansas two rows for 12. A filled circle is a hit and an open circle is a miss, which makes the full shooter-by-shooter record readable from a single frame.
| Team | Competitor | Clays hit |
|---|---|---|
| Arkansas | Gary Penna | 6 of 6 |
| Arkansas | Justin Mills | 4 of 6 |
| Florida | First shooter | 3 of 6 |
| Florida | Second shooter | 2 of 6 |
| Florida | Matt | 6 of 6 |
| Final | Arkansas 10 of 12 | Florida 11 of 18 |
How the score moved
6–10
Arkansas has finished all 12 shots. Florida still has a round left.
9–10
Two Florida shots remain. Both have to break for Florida to win.
11–10
Both fall. Florida wins the challenge by one clay.
A verbal call of eleven to ten is audible on the soundtrack at the moment the graphic still reads 9 to 10. The graphic is treated here as the authoritative record for that instant, with the verbal call read as anticipation of the two shots still to come.
Both sides brought a ringer
Gary Penna, Bourbon Club of Arkansas
Penna said that when he saw the guns coming out he knew he was going to have a fun day. He shot competitively in the Air Force, and his first college girlfriend’s father was a world champion skeet shooter, so he spent a lot of time on the range with him. He went six for six.
A Florida competitor summed up the problem from the other side: the guy they were playing against had been a competitive shooter in the military.
Matt, Southwest Florida Bourbon Society
Matt said he grew up on a farm where if it moved, it got shot at, and that shooting was his physical education credit for four years. He also kept that to himself until it mattered.
His teammate Jake said the fun part was that Matt was so good at it and knew that they did not know, so he let the others go first and said nothing. Jake’s verdict was that Matt carried them.
Penna was quick to frame the loss generously afterward, pointing out that Arkansas got 10 with two shooters against Florida’s 11 with three, and adding that a blowout is not fun to watch and it was good to see the other team come back and take some points. Jason, a Florida competitor, put it more plainly: he was glad he did not have to throw away his Florida driver’s license.
Matt Madness: the house blender grades the guests
Back at Barrel King in the Barrel House, Kaynon introduced a very special guest, and Matt Porter walked in wearing a gold and teal paisley suit and sunglasses. The episode gives the segment its own title card and its own name in the episode title: Matt Madness.
Porter is not a neutral outsider. He is Barrel King’s Chief Tasting Officer and Master Blender, appointed in 2023. He runs the YouTube channel ADHD Whiskey, judges Fred Minnick’s ASCOT Awards, was named World’s Top Whiskey Taster by Bardstown Bourbon Company in 2020 and is a two-time national blending champion. He tells the room he was invited to Bourbon, Missouri because someone told him there was a group of whiskey tasters worth evaluating, then says he is not sure he sees it.
The format was four glasses, a nosing round of four questions and a tasting round of four more, with the highest combined score taking the win. Point values varied by question and Porter announced them as he went. Age questions paid five points for an exact answer, three for within one year and one for within two.
The performance was the point as much as the quiz. Porter counted down out of order, told the competitors he likes to lie a lot, called one of them Georges St-Pierre, and at one stage announced that both teams were wrong before adding that it was opposite day and they had it right. Penna did not initially read it as a bit. He is heard wondering aloud what is happening and describing Porter as a dick. Matt of Team Florida had seen Porter’s live streams before and knew exactly what was going on, and said the funniest part was watching Penna actually get mad while the rest of them let it run.
The full scorecard
Every question, every answer given and every point awarded, in the order Porter read them out.
| Question | Correct answer | Florida | Arkansas |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nose, glass A: whiskey type (3 pts) | Rye | Rye — 3 | Wrote “which” — 0 |
| Nose, glass B: state of distillation | Indiana | Indiana — 0 | Indiana — 0 |
| Nose, glass C: age (5/3/1) | 8 years | 7 years — 3 | 8 years — 5 |
| Nose, glass D: more or less than 21% rye (3 pts) | More | More — 3 | More — 3 |
| Nosing subtotal | 9 | 8 | |
| Palate, sample A: age (5/3/1) | 6 years | 8 years — 1 | 6 years — 5 |
| Palate, sample B: whiskey type | Not disclosed | Bourbon — 0 | Corn whiskey — 0 |
| Palate, sample C: distillery | Not disclosed | Heaven Hill — 0 | Balcones — 0 |
| Palate, sample D: state of distillation (4 pts) | Kentucky | Kentucky — 4 | Texas — 0 |
| Final | 14 | 13 |
The glass B anomaly
Both teams answered Indiana on the second nosing question, and Porter confirms on camera that it was Indiana distillate. No point value is ever announced for that question and no points are awarded for it.
The arithmetic makes this unambiguous. Porter announces a nosing subtotal of 9 to 8 and a final of 14 to 13. Florida’s 9 is exactly three points for glass A, three for glass C and three for glass D. Arkansas’s 8 is zero, five and three. Both totals only reconcile if glass B paid nothing to either team. This record therefore documents the question as correctly answered by both teams and unscored, rather than filling in a point value that was never stated.
What the four samples actually were
The questions disclose a partial profile of each glass and nothing more. Porter never reveals the full identity of any sample.
- Glass A. A rye. Six years old on the tasting round answer.
- Glass B. Distilled in Indiana. Neither bourbon nor corn whiskey, since both guesses were marked wrong. Type never stated.
- Glass C. Eight years old. Neither Heaven Hill nor Balcones. Distillery never stated.
- Glass D. More than 21 percent rye in the mash bill. Distilled in Kentucky.
Porter initially framed the fourth nosing question as more or less than 20 percent rye before correcting himself to 21 percent. The 21 percent figure is the one used in the scoring.
Porter closed by congratulating Florida on a one-point win and telling both teams that this is how you piss him off and also taste and smell whiskey well. A Florida competitor called it a treat and said they were better friends for it.
Two philosophies at the blending table
With the scored challenges done, Kaynon sent both teams to blend until further notice. The episode intercuts the two rooms, and the contrast in method is the most substantive whiskey content in the episode.
Arkansas: slow down before you dump
Mills wanted to move. Penna pulled him back, saying they were jumping ahead and could not be dumping anything until they were sure. Their working method was to pull a sample, add a little O.Z. Tyler, and if it popped, commit the extra bottle or two to the batch.
Mills framed it as a chef’s move: the blend is already good, so the last addition is the salt at the end. The volume figure they land on brings the batch to roughly 500 bottle-equivalents.
Florida: follow the nose, not a formula
The Florida room described its own approach as doing some science, research and development. The stated principle was to follow the nose and the taste rather than a formula.
Kaynon asks whether a barrel on the table is an MGP and is told yes. A competitor says it is very good and that he would drink it. Someone in this stretch also says the team knows it is making a bourbon, though the intercutting makes it difficult to attribute that line to a specific speaker with confidence.
Jason Callori noted that a Barrel King staffer identified on camera only as Max had been dumping barrels for both teams and supplying small quantities as they built their batches up. Max does not appear on Barrel King’s published team page and his role is not stated in the episode.
The 500-bottle floor. Episode 1 established that each final blend has to yield at least 500 bottles and no more than 1,300, drawn from stock aged five to 18 years. Callori restates the 500-bottle target during the feedback session and explains the squeeze it creates: once a team is at 450 bottles, it has only 50 bottles of room left to fix whatever is wrong. Arkansas ended Episode 2 at 153 bottle-equivalents, so the jump to roughly 500 across day two is the single largest volume move documented in the series so far.
The precise Arkansas figure is not fully settled in the source material. The episode’s automatic captions render it as 500, which would place the batch exactly on the minimum. An independent transcription pass renders the same line as 502. Both readings are preserved here rather than resolved by preference, since the difference between landing on the floor and clearing it by two bottles is materially different as a record of the day’s work.
The feedback session, one day before the verdict
Kaynon brought in the judges to give feedback before the final verdict the following day. Callori set the terms immediately: they had two blends from two teams, they did not know whose was whose, and this was not about picking a winner yet.
Blend A · Bourbon Club of Arkansas
Nose. Butter, dark fruit and confectioner’s sugar. Callori got something bready he first called toasted bagel, then narrowed toward cinnamon raisin and a buttery croissant. Bunch called it a little ethanol forward but noted it was a fresh blend. Good color.
Palate. Brighter than expected. Sharp, and still a little fermenty up front. Callori liked the first sip a lot but found that on the second sip things leveled out too quickly, flattening the nuances he was looking for.
Guidance. Bring sweet oak and age to the back end. Keep the sharpness but balance it. Bunch called the blend slightly imbalanced toward the younger barrels in the room, praised the nose and called the palate phenomenal with great transitions, and put it at 85 to 90 percent done with roughly 10 percent of the work left.
The verdict in the room. Porter said he loved it but that it was missing the thing that makes you say wow, and that what it did have was a great deal of potential. Bunch put it more precisely: it needs a defining characteristic. Callori’s summary was that A is in a good spot.
Blend B · Southwest Florida Bourbon Society
Nose. Very sweet, with sugar sitting on top. Bunch said it almost smelled like an American light bourbon blend because of how much sugar was there. Porter reached for rock candy and Callori for the coarse sugar chunks on a Liège waffle.
Palate. Cherry pie and cherry cobbler the whole way through, with no change of direction. The panel agreed it promises to develop and then does not. Bunch called it one note and missing multiple layers, and said it was solidifying rather than opening as it sat.
Guidance. Something earthy to balance the sweetness, whether that arrives as age, oak or rye spice. Bunch, who believed the blend was the bourye, recommended pushing the older ryes to bring peppery notes to the back, separate the mid palate and build layers. Callori called it cloyingly sweet. Porter said he did not care what note it picked up as long as it shifted gears.
Next step. Bunch said it needed to sit overnight to see how it separated, and that he would spend the following day making the flavors transition rather than staying compact and unified through the middle.
Porter’s closing thought on both blends was that they could not be more different and that they could both have been far worse. Being at the point where each one needs only a little of this or a little of that, he said, was remarkable.
Two of the three judges work for Barrel King
Episode 3’s feedback panel is not a group of outside personalities. Jason Callori of The Mash and Drum is the independent voice. The other two are house staff, which changes how the technical notes should be read.
Matt Porter is Barrel King’s Chief Tasting Officer and Master Blender. The same person who ran Matt Madness and personally scored the teams 14 to 13 then sat down to evaluate their blends.
Matt Bunch is Barrel King’s Distillery Manager. He joined the company as a Gold member near the beginning, brings over 25 years of manufacturing and process experience, and has contributed to earlier blend releases and barrel picks including batches 31 and 64 and the release known as BETA. His percentage-complete assessment of blend A carries the weight of someone who runs the facility rather than a guest taster.
Barrel King is co-founded by Rachael and Jarrod Record and operates from 126 West Pine Street, Suite B, in Bourbon, Missouri. Roles cited here come from the company’s published team page.
Everyone on camera in Episode 3
| Name | Affiliation | Role in Episode 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Kaynon Castille | The Bourbon Pour | Host |
| Matt Porter | Barrel King; ADHD Whiskey | Ran Matt Madness; blend judge |
| Matt Bunch | Barrel King, Distillery Manager | Blend judge |
| Jason Callori | The Mash and Drum | Blend judge |
| Jarrod Record | Barrel King, Co-Founder | On site during skeet |
| Gary Penna | Bourbon Club of Arkansas | Team Arkansas; 6 of 6 in skeet |
| Justin Mills | Bourbon Club of Arkansas | Team Arkansas; 4 of 6 in skeet |
| Jake | Southwest Florida | Team Florida |
| Jason | Southwest Florida | Team Florida |
| Matt | Southwest Florida | Team Florida; 6 of 6 in skeet |
Cigars, dinner and three Route 66 towns
The closing voiceover states that the teams are tied in challenges won and that the winner will be decided by whoever wins the best blend on the final day. Before that, the whole group went out.
Bourbon
Barrel King, 126 West Pine Street, Suite B. Where both challenges and all the blending took place.
St. James
Cigars at Leatherwood Handmade Cigars, 115 W Springfield Street. A family-run humidor and members lounge.
Cuba
Dinner at East Office Bar & Grill, 406 E Washington Street. The hand-painted sign reads East Office Bar-N-Grill.
Penna gave the toast that closes the episode, a compressed version of the old line about drinking with your own kind: since they are all a bunch of whiskey people, here is to us and those of you like us, too damn few.
Barrel King closed with the same open call it has run all series. Bourbon clubs that think they have what it takes are invited to email a video to [email protected] with the subject line “The Next Bourbon Games Winner.”
This account draws on the episode itself, its automatic captions, an independent speaker-labeled transcription pass, and frame captures taken at specific timecodes. Where the two transcription passes disagree, both readings are preserved.
- Matt Porter’s opening line. One pass has him saying he was told there was a group of whiskey tasters who were worth something; the other has the opposite polarity. His follow-up, that he is not sure he sees it, reads differently under each. The line is paraphrased here rather than quoted.
- The Arkansas volume figure. Rendered as 500 in one pass and 502 in the other. Both are documented above.
- The final tasting question. Labeled sample B in the automatic captions, but Porter’s own scoring summary and the second transcription pass both identify it as sample D. Sample D is used here.
- The skeet score at 7:07. A verbal call of eleven to ten overlaps a graphic reading 9 to 10. The graphic is treated as authoritative for that moment.
- Speaker attribution. Automatic speaker separation splits Matt Porter’s scoring announcement across two speaker identities and is unreliable through the intercut blending sequence. Attributions in this article rely on content and on-screen presence rather than on automatic diarization alone.
- Publication dates. YouTube reports an upload date for Episode 3 that precedes the date recorded for Episode 2. The platform-reported dates for the series are therefore out of sequence and are not used here to establish chronology.
Level going into the final blend
Arkansas took the opening bottle-sales challenge, the cornhole series and the single barrel challenge. Florida has now taken skeet and Matt Madness. That is two challenges each across three episodes, and the narrator’s framing of the standings is a tie in challenges won.
The largest prize in the competition is still unclaimed. Half of everything both teams raised follows the winner of the final blend, and both blends still needed work when the day ended. Arkansas needs age and oak on the back end to settle the ethanol. Florida needs anything at all that is not sweet.
For the competition rules, the team introductions and the opening 40 to 19 result, see the Episode 1 recap. The cornhole sweep and the blind single barrel challenge are covered in the Episode 2 recap. Background on both clubs appears in the Season 1 preview, in ArkansasLiquor.com’s coverage of the Bourbon Club of Arkansas entering the competition and in the April 2026 charity barrel showdown.
Sources: Bourbon Games Season 1, Episode 3, published by Mixx Tank; the episode’s published description, chapter markers and captions; frame captures from the episode; Barrel King’s official series page; Barrel King’s team page for the roles of Matt Porter, Matt Bunch, Jarrod Record and Rachael Record; and Leatherwood Handmade Cigars for the St. James location.
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Justin Jones
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