Sprudge has formally rejoined both US Coffee Champs and World Coffee Events as an official media partner, effective today. This move comes as a response to a spate of changes and much-needed oversight around issues of site selection and “Deferred Candidacy” announced by the SCA earlier this summer.

Expect an immediate return to Sprudge's industry-leading coverage of the Specialty Coffee Association competition circuit for the 2019 season, including coverage of the 2019 US Coffee Champs Preliminaries, US Coffee Champs Qualifiers, and 2019 US Barista Championship. As always, this coverage will be hubbed at Sprudge Live, our node for worldwide coffee sports, which has new content today featuring interviews with some recent champions.

For readers outside the United States, we're accepting proposals for coverage of a variety of national coffee championships in 2019 outside the United States. If you're interested in having Sprudge cover your national event, do get in touch.

Our 2019 coverage agreement leads up to the 2019 World Barista Championship and World Brewers Cup events in Boston, April 11-14th and the 2019 World Latte Art Championship, World Cup Tasters Championship, World Coffee In Good Spirits Championship, and the Cezve/Ibrik Championship tournaments in Berlin June 8th-10th.

“We at the SCA are happy to renew our relationship with Sprudge with whom we have been working for nearly a decade. Sprudge.com is a compelling resource for the specialty coffee community and we know our competitors, judges, volunteers, and staff will be excited to see [Sprudge founders] Jordan, Zachary, and their team of writers covering our competitions and other activities once again. Both our organizations are committed to serving and informing the specialty coffee community and we are confident that thisrenewed relationship supports that goal and our mission to serve coffee professionals everywhere.” —Ric Rhinehart, SCA Executive Director

On a personal note, we're thrilled to be back covering the events we love so dearly. Our media network has covered the US and World Barista Championships in exhaustive detail each year since 2010, and so on behalf of everyone involved in this coverage—our competition teams, our editors, and owners—today is a really happy day for us. In the coming days and weeks you'll see coverage ramp up on the 2019 US Coffee Champs Preliminaries season to date, with a return to full coverage—including @SprudgeLive live Tweets—for the Denver Qualifying event, December 1-2nd.

To everyone around the world who reached out to us over the last 18 months with messages of support, please know that these words have meant the world to us. To the many hundreds of readers (and competitors, and SCA staffers, and volunteers) who have reached out publicly and privately to express how much you've missed our coverage over the last two seasons, thank you a thousand times. We're picking up right where we left off and very happy to be back.

For now, jam over to Sprudge Live and check out interviews with 2018 World Barista Champion Agnieszka Rojewska and 2018 US Brewers Cup Champion Becca Woodward, with more to come in the coming days. Thank you for reading Sprudge for supporting the Sprudge Media Network.

Top photo by Charlie Burt for Sprudge Media Network.