Russian Wines Competition 2018©
Tasting of Russian wines
The international panel of nine certified wine experts (France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands, Russia, the Czech Republic, Sweden) did a blind wine tasting of Russian-made wines grading them on a 100-point scale by making use of specialized VinAgora International Wine Competition Evaluation Software approved by OIV (the International Organization of Vine and Wine) for the purpose of holding competitions.
A tasting was carried out in four categories: sparkling wines produced by the traditional method, sparkling wines produced by the tank method, still white wines and still red wines.
180 Russian wines were evaluated. Experts judged every sample acting in all objectivity and impartiality relying on their experience and highly proficient wine qualifications.
The aims and objectives of the competition:
- To get impartial information about the quality of Russian wines evaluated by certified and professional tasters – Masters of Wine and Weinakademikers;
- To hold a tasting competition with independent panel involved;
- To promote quality Russian wines;
- To provide consumers with reliable information about the quality of Russian wines;
- To tighten requirements imposed on panel members involved in Russia-based international wine competitions;
- To prevent Russian wine producers from stagnating and to encourage them to keep working on the wine quality;
- To promote competition triggered by Russian wines evaluation results;
- To spread information about Russian wines throughout the world wine community.
Tasting panel members:
- Caro Maurer - Master of Wine (Germany);
- Frank Smulders - Master of Wine (the Netherlands);
- Madeleine Stenwreth - Master of Wine (Sweden);
- Jeremy Cukierman - Master of Wine (France);
- Yiannis Karakasis - Master of Wine (Greece);
- Leonid Fadeev - Weinakademiker (Russia);
- Tatiana Selivanova - Weinakademiker (Russia);
- Zoltan Santa - Weinakademiker (Hungary);
- Klara Kollarova - Weinakademiker (the Czech Republic).
Winemaking consultant:
Frank Duseigneur – Oenologist (France).
The winemaking consultant’s contest responsibilities involved:- checking wines for faults;
- if necessary, clarifying wine issues and counseling the tasting jury on the quality of samples;
- providing explanation (on the tasting jury’s demand) for the nature of the revealed wine faults.
During the competition the wine consultant tasted wines along with the tasting jury, though he was not supposed to give scores. The final decision on each tasting sample was taken by the tasting jury.
Competition facilitator:
Impartiality concept:
- Panel members did not have any labour and/or direct commercial relations with wine producers whose wines were tasted at the competition;
- No panel member belonged to any associations with producers whose wines were tasted at the competition;
- Wines to be tasted were bought in retail chains the way consumers do; obtaining wines from producers was unacceptable;
- No help (including financial) offered by producers whose wines were tasted was accepted.
Objectivity concept:
- All tasting panel members were professional tasters which was confirmed by the facts that they did wine courses at The Institute of Masters of Wine, Weinakademie Osterreich and Wine and Spirit Education Trust; got qualifications in wine; earned titles of Master of Wine, Weinakademiker and DipWSET;
- Every tasting panel member had at least 5-year experience in wine business;
- Seven panel members were foreign residents and only two were representatives of the host country;
- A new panel chair out of Masters of Wine was appointed every day;
- Wines were graded on a 100-point scale using VinAgora International Wine Competition Evaluation Software (Hungary) under its developers’ supervision;
- Wines were evaluated without regard for personal preferences. Subjective evaluation following the principle “like/dislike”, “wine style that appeals/ doesn’t appeal to me” or “my favourite/least favourite kind of wine” was unacceptable;
- There was an odd number of experts, 9;
- Wines were tasted blindly, submitted to a tasting by the impartial staff of VinAgora International Wine Competition Evaluation Software (Hungary) on condition of anonymity until grades were revealed;
- No more than 30% of sampled wines received medals.
The competition results are available free at VINEANDWINE.VIN.
Based on competition results the best wines in every category were awarded the title of the best Russian wine of 2018 according to Russian Wines Competition©. The competition was non-commercial.
Sponsors of the competition:
Cote Rocheuse JSC
Chateau de Talus
The competition was supported by:
Weinakademie Osterreich
World Sommelier Academy of Bordeaux
North Caucasian Federal Scientific Center of Horticulture, Viticulture, Winemaking
Kuban State Technological University
Venue:
Kempinski Grand Hotel Gelendzhik Black Sea
Technical support and competition’s evaluation software by:
Hungarian Viti- and Viniculture Nonprofit Ltd
The competition media partners:
Authorities of the resort town of Gelendzhik
STS Gelendzhik TV-Radio company
Pro Kurort information portal
Russian agrarian newspaper Land and Life
Gelendzhik local newspaper Priboi
Russian agrarian portal
Weekly local newspaper Gelendzhik Week
News outlet NewsFrol