Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008

What the Show says about SA Wine quality in 2008, by Michael Fridjhon, Chairman of the judges

Every edition of the Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show has its own personality - a combination of the dominant features of the wines which have been entered, the preferences of the judges, and the fashions of the domestic and international wine industries. For example, in the past, obsessions with faults caused by closures or concerns about lax cellar practices have spilled over into the post-judging feedback session which takes place immediately after the trophy judging. This has produced not only the kind of discussion and controversy which is good for winemakers and consumers alike, but drives changes in the way things are done.

This self-generating personality which emerges over the fours days of judging stamps its own imprint on the results for that year. It means that, despite the chairman's injunctions on the stylistic focus of the Show, the dynamic of the panels is as much a determinant of an aesthetic message as any guideline laid out at the beginning of the Show. How the judges interact, the preferences of any two members of the panel, and of course the features of the wines on the tasting bench, all contribute to the personality that emerges within the classes themselves and in the Show as a whole.

The 2008 Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show was no exception. Although many of the panellists had served in previous years (including one of the international judges, Anthony Rose, who participated in the inaugural competition in 2002), several were first-time participants on the Show's tasting teams. Their predilections, as much as the dynamic of panels which are changed daily, are reflected in this year's results. Notwithstanding this caveat, there is a sense that the overall assessment of each class is fairly contained in the medal tally.

Chardonnay was not as strong this year as it had been in 2007. No one on the panels - nor I as the chairman of the judges - would seriously dispute that. Instead of there being four or five gold medals in the class - the kind of result seen in 2007 - there was a solitary laureate taking the trophy without the need for a competitive taste-off. A quick glance at the silver and bronze medallists shows that the serious contenders were all there, and that their achievements percolated to the top of the inherently weaker class. But it is as if there had been a downward bracket creep compared with the 2007 Show, and this was not a function of a less generous panel but rather a reflection of the vintage.

In fact, at the post-judging feedback session vintage variation was frequently cited as the major influence on the medal crops in the particular classes. Both the 2006 Shiraz and the 2006 Cabernets yielded all the gold medals for those varieties. They were obviously the youngest major segment in their particular categories, and although in the midst of judging both panels were optimistic that they would find more gold medals among the older vintages, as things turned out the weaker 2005s were as unsuccessful in the Shiraz class as they had been when judged last year - where only a single gold medal emerged from the largest class of entry on the Show.

Especially in the red wine classes, generally younger wines dominated the medals because of their more pronounced flavour profiles - and of course the industry's ongoing investment in upgrading planting material and learning from the comments of its critics, However, Museum Class entries continued to box above their weight, and since submissions in 2008 were substantially up on previous years their presence is more evident in this year's medal tally. One statistic says it all: 7.5% of Museum Class wines made it to the trophy judging, compared with 2.1% for all the other wines - an indication that in some categories, most notably fortified wines, panellists venerate old-wine characters.

Allowing for these nuances, the Show produced a good spread of results across many of the more important classes. Sauvignon Blanc, the entry of which grows in number every year, yielded two golds - one for an unwooded wine, another for an obviously (but very subtly) oaked candidate. Likewise, the blended white wine class garnered a pair of golds in one of the smallest - but consistently successful - categories. Semillon did well to secure two gold medals and Chenin was perhaps unlucky to have marked its territory with only one.

Among the Noble Late Harvests, golds were up on 2007 but still below the potential of the industry to yield and celebrate world class dessert wines. Ports tracked the historical average, but Muscadels made it to the trophy judging for the first time since the 2002 Show.
The Merlot class yielded a particularly impressive solo gold, and so did the Pinot Noirs (only the second non-Museum Pinot gold in the history of the Show). Red blends, other than Bordeaux-style combinations which took home two gold medals, all proved a big disappointment. Panellist Christian Eedes, addressing the post-judging press conference, maintained (not uncontroversially) that the idea of resurrecting interest in the Pinotage category by promoting the idea of the "Cape Blend" should be abandoned firmly, but discreetly.

The Shiraz class is clearly coming of age, with a choice of styles and evidence of obvious fruit quality supporting the claims of those punting the class, as well as the growers whose plantings account for the biggest new vineyard investment in 21st century South Africa. Bordeaux-style blends and Cabernet Sauvignon are showing comparable strength and diversity in the medal-winning top 25% of the entry, but, like Shiraz, a frightening array of poor, disappointing and downright faulty submissions in the bottom 25%.

In fact, faults ranging from viticultural under-management to ill-conceived and poorly executed wines produced in unhygienic cellars continue to plague the industry and to temper the otherwise upbeat nature of this review. For all the progress made by the serious players whose wines continue to dominate the medal lists, and by newcomers who have heeded the comments made by the Show's judges over the past few years, there is a paunchy underbelly of dross. Not only is there the usual array of bacterial spoilage, ‘brett'-infected over-ripe and porty reds, pongy, reduced and volatile submissions, but the latest lament from the UK's wine writers - an unidentified "rubbery smell" - is becoming increasingly evident. Given the avoidable faults still widely in evidence, especially among red wines, the presence of something still requiring positive diagnosis should be a matter of grave concern.

BY THE NUMBERS

1024 wines judged in total
968 in 2007, 961 in 2006

318 medals awarded
237 in 2007, 297 in 2006

242 bronze medal winners
175 in 2007, 227 in 2006

52 silver medal winners
38 in 2007, 46 in 2006

24 gold medal winners
24 in 2007, 24 in 2006

23 producers won gold
21 in 2007, 20 in 2006

19 trophies awarded
19 in 2007, 19 in 2006

16 trophy-winning wines
15 in 2007, 15 in 2006

16 trophy-winning producers
13 in 2007, 12 in 2006

3 won more than one trophy
4 in 2007, 5 in 2006

Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008 winners

Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008 results by category

Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008 Judges

Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008 Judge's feedback session

Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008 most successful cellars

Old Mutual Trophy Wine Show 2008 - About the show

Winning Wineries 2008 (330.89kb)