Sagamore Spirit, founded by Under Armour’s Kevin Plank, is a Baltimore-based distillery that currently sources their rye whiskey from MGP while they distill and age their own stock. Unlike other “craft” distilleries that often make a range of whiskeys, Sagamore Spirit only sells rye whiskeys (albeit often with interesting finishes), including the Sagamore Spirit Moscatel Finish I previously reviewed. In this review, I dive into Sagamore Spirit Barrel Select, this one selected for Costco in Washington DC.
This particular Sagamore Spirit “Ryan’s Barrel Select 2019” comes from barrel 71 at location F6/R3. At 55%, it’s also nearly cask strength, with many of the standard Sagamore Spirit Cask Strengths clocking in around 55-58%. One misconception is that “barrel select” means single barrel. This in fact is not a single barrel rye whiskey.
I asked Sagamore Spirit and they said that Costco selected 1 of 4 high rye (95% rye) barrels that was then blended with a “mid rye” (probably 51% rye) barrel, making this a ~73% rye mash depending on the proportion of liquid in each barrel. In this case, “Barrel Select” means that one of the barrels in the blend was selected. Anyways, let’s find out if Ryan did a good job picking one of the barrels in this Sagamore Spirit Barrel Select review.
* April 2020 update: Sagamore Spirit Barrel Select (but not this particular one) won double gold at the 2020 San Francisco World Spirits Competition.