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| Lackluster Year for Michigan at San Francisco Competition |
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Michigan wines turned in a mediocre performance at the San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competitiion in early January, earning one Best of Class and three other gold medals, but just a single gold in the state's traditionally strongest wine categories.
Other entries from those wineries, along with wines from Bowers Harbor, Chateau Grand Traverse, Longview, and Shady Lane earned more than two dozen lesser medals, including several for 2007 Riesling. Both Bowers Harbor and Chateau Grand Traverse won silver medals for Pinot Noir Rosé. But no Michigan-appellation wine took gold in such normally-strong categories as Sparkling Wine, Riesling, Pinot Gris or Gewurztraminer. New York's Finger Lakes region, frequently compared with Michigan's climate, took four gold medals for Riesling alone. Black Star Farms did earn one distinction. At its $92.50 retail price, the "A Capella", made from Old Mission Peninsula grapes, cost in excess of $30 more than any other medal-winnng dessert wine. Wineries from 26 states entered more than 4700 wines in the San Francisco competition, which calls itself the nation's largest competiton among American wine. Because the competition, like most others, does not release the names of non-medal winning entries, it's impossible to know which other Michigan wines and wineries, if any, were entered in the competition. --------- CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article inadvertently omitted Grand Traverse Select Riesling, a label made by Chateau Grand Traverse, from Michigan wineries' gold medal winners. That's been corrected where it occurred in the article. ADDENDUM: Thanks to Bryan Ulbrich's comments (below), the entire list of Michigan medal winners from the San Francisco competition is now available here for you to view, print or downlaod.
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Trackback(0)TrackBack URI for this entryComments (4)Show/Hide comments Asylum Resident
It seems to me that every competition is "one of the nation's largest and most prestigous". Do you think we have reached a point of saturation with these "competitions"? The competition circuit is getting bloated with prestigious opportunities for self promotion. They are increasingly expensive and many require so much wine that you wonder whether this is really a judging, a party, or a cellar building program for some wine writers. I am not speaking to the SF Chronicle specifically as I have never entered it and do not know the fees or volume required.
Also, are we experiencing a deflation in the value of Silver and Bronze medals? A silver medal used to mean that the wine is varietally pure, balanced and has an extra set of qualities that make it more interesting. If the competition is indeed prestigous then they should be even more valuable. The article makes them seem shameful. Maybe we should do away with the "lesser" medals altogether if they do not represent quality anymore. A competition then could consist of only 20 medals, period - one for each category - everyone else gets skunked.
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January 22, 2009
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But you guys keep them going!
Bryan, I pretty much agree, but the bottom line is that competitions keep going based on the number of entries they receive -- and SF had a record number this year. If enough of your fellow wineries didn't perceive PR value in chasing medals all over the country, lots of competitions would be out of business. I regularly see press releases from other MI wineries that proclaim the medals they've come home with from far-flung places, so that speaks for itself.
You're preaching to the choir on the number of medals. Last August, we Michigan judges handed them out to 74% of the entries in our state's award-fest -- meaning that the majority of bronzes actually went to wines that were below the mean quality of those entered. That's nuts. At the All-Canada Wine Championships, judges score the wines but don't give out medals. The top-scoring 10% automatically get gold, the next 10% silver, and the third 10% bronze -- which automatically keeps medals to 30%. I'd add one twist to factor in bad vintages: wines would also need to meet a minimum score at each medal level. So in some years, there might be fewer than 10% gold medals -- which would just reflect the reality that we didn't taste as many top-tier wines that year.
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January 22, 2009
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The Market is definately vast for wine comps and they are valuable marketing tools for the wineries. My point is that if this competition is so prestigious (which I agree that it is), then a silver medal is something to be proud of. I have not looked I admit, but I am willing to bet that there are some pretty remarkable wines from around the world that received silver and bronze as well. The article lauds the validity of the gold but dimisnishes the rest as lackluster. It can't be prestigous and meaningless at the same time. If its a poorly run competition that's one thing, but the SF Chronicle should have some pretty high standards.
The most prized medal I had received for a long time was a bronze at the San Francisco Intl. Despite many prior Best of Show trophies, double golds, golds etc., that bronze stood out precisely because of the quality of the judging not because of its color. Having a Trimbach and a Navarro share that rank helped as well. I think it still hangs on a lab cabinet door at Peninsula Cellars as a reminder of a time when our (Michigan's) quality far outpaced wine critic acceptance and reputation. "You can't grow grapes way up north!?!" These competitions are fickle you have to admit. I'd pay to enter a wine competition where the same judges rate the same wines twice on two consecutive weekends in the same room to see how the results shakedown. It could be a judges judging 
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January 22, 2009
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Medal list now online
Thanks to your well-taken comments, Michigan's entire San Francisco medal-winner list is now online, linked at the end of the article.
And you're right, in my pantheon bronze medals don't get no respect. At least here in Michigan, the attitude seems to be "It's reasonably drinkable, let's give it a bronze." Things may be different elsewhere, but that's not entirely clear to me. The judging will certainly vary depending on which table your wine draws, who at the table likes it or doesn't, and what other wines it's tasted with. And one other thing: I know that my palate becomes a lot better by 11AM than when we get started at 8:30... I actually feel sorry for those first-of-the-morning bubbly and dry white flights. Maybe that's an argument for keeping so many competitions around, since the law of averages will doubtless randomize themselves at some stage.
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January 22, 2009
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St. Julian's "White Heron" took Best of Class in the "White Native American Blends" category. Other gold medal winners were Black Star Farms' "A Capella" Riesling Ice Wine, Grand Traverse Select "Sweet Harvest" American Riesling and 45 North's Hard Cider.
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