Participants
Leonid FadeevWeinakademiker (Russia)
Leonid began his meteoric wine career in March 2013 by receiving a job offer to run a vine growing and winemaking start-up, Cote Rocheuse JSC, in the south of Russia, the town of Anapa, Krasnodar Region.
A beautiful and quality-oriented vineyard of 32 hectares was planted from scratch, right on the Black Sea coast.
In 2014 having a thirst for wine knowledge Leonid committed to wine qualifications. He went to France to study at the World Sommelier Academy of Bordeaux (WorldSom). He successfully passed all 6 final exams, qualified as the Magister Sommelier (so far the only one from Russia) and became Commandeurs d’Honneur of the Commanderie du Bontemps de Médoc, des Graves, de Sauternes et de Barsac.
After that he continued his wine journey with Wine and Spirit Education Trust (WSET). In 2015 he fared well at WSET Level 2 and Level 3 at Bordeaux Wine Campus, France.
Leonid didn’t rest on his laurels. He enrolled for WSET Diploma International Program (Rust, Vienna, Florence) at the Austrian Wine Academy (Weinakademie Osterreich) in Rust, Austria in May 2016. Studying hard he managed to complete the program strikingly fast. It took him 1 year and 3 months to cover all 7 Units, pass all exams at the first attempt and to receive prestigious DipWSET and Weinakademiker qualifications.
According to the director of the Austrian Wine Academy Dr. Josef Schuller MW nobody has ever completed the WSET Diploma/Weinakademiker program in a foreign language in such a short space of time.
The subject of his thesis at the Austrian Wine Academy was “Brettanomyces in Wine, a Fault or Not?” which he defended with distinction.
He is currently working at Cote Rocheuse as Executive Director, developing the company with perseverance and continuing his wine education.