Being a barista is a full-contact sport, one you have to do with a smile on your face. And that may be truer than ever this Saturday, September 1st at Iconik Coffee Roasters in Santa Fe, New Mexico. To christen their brand new location (featured earlier this week as part of our Build-Outs of Summer series), Iconik is hosting the first annual Southwest Barista Olympics, a multi-discipline contest to determine which barista is the fittest and the littest.

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The competition consists of three different events: a pentagon cupping, where participants try to guess the origin of a coffee based on taste alone; a coffee mocktail contest; and a barista obstacle course, โ€œrequiring the most refined and fierce barista skills.โ€ The winner will be crowned the Southwest Barista Olympics champion, earning them entry into the US Barista Olympics, should such a thing actually exist (it doesnโ€™tโ€ฆ yet).

For those not looking to compete but still wanting to come hang, there will be all sorts of food, ice cream, live music, and prize giveaways from sponsors including: The El Rey Inn, Ojo Caliente, Fire and Hops, The Grove, and Ten Thousand Waves.

It all gets started at 5:00pm on Saturday, September 1st at Iconik Coffee Roasters’ brand new Guadalupe Street location. For more information, visit the Southwest Barista Olympics Facebook event page. Time to limber up.

Zac Cadwaladerย is the news editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas.ย Read more Zac Cadwaladerย on Sprudge.

Top image via Iconik Coffee Roasters

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