Yesterday was the first day’s judging at the International Wine Challenge (IWC). Taking place at the Oval Cricket Ground, which has been an excellent home to the challenge for the last few years, it’s a major operation with 20 tables of five judges working hard all day. This first week involves four days of sifting through all entries (and there are lots – there were around 15 000 last year, although numbers aren’t talked about openly because it just ends up in an arms race with another large UK-based competition). We are looking to see whether the wines are medal worthy or not, and those that pass through will come back next week to be looked at in more detail. A team of co-chairs checks all the rejected entries this week as a back-up mechanism to make sure that no good wines have been unfairly rejected, and also to harmonise standards.

I had a lovely team yesterday. One of the strengths of the competition is that places to judge are sought-after, so the organizers can be picky about who they choose. Everyone is subject to peer feedback, including us panel chairs. If anyone shows a track record of poor performance, they don’t get asked back. If anyone excels, they can be promoted from associate to judge, then to senior judge, and eventually panel chair. Promotion is based on performance, and at the end of the two weeks we panel chairs get a report on how well we and our teams performed, showing areas where we need to develop and congratulating us where we have done well.

So, this was how our day looked:

• Flight 1 New Zealand sparkling wine – pretty good
• Flight 2 Brouilly – some nice wines, some very commercial ones
• Flight 3 South African Sauvignon Blanc – poor wines unfortunately
• Flight 4 Cabernet-based reds from the Veneto – these were a bit strange
• Flight 5 Barolo – as you’d expect, a few nice wines and some ordinary ones too
• Flight 6 South African Chardonnay – pretty good, some nice wines
• Flight 7 Minervois – not as good as we were expecting
• Flight 8 Pouilly Fuissé – a small, strong flight
• Flight 9 Spanish reds – a short flight of three oddities that weren’t nice
• Flight 10 Douro reds – some smart wines here
• Flight 11 Douro whites – a bit underwhelming
• Flight 12 Greek reds – these weren’t very good alas, Greece can do much better
• Flight 13 Turkish reds – ditto
• Flight 14 20 year old tawny Port – a very strong flight and a good way to finish

As you can see, it’s a varied diet of wines, and this helps to keep the palate fresh. It’s also a great way to get a snapshot of what is going on across the world of wine. With 103 wines in all, it’s a comfortable number to taste because we aren’t taking detailed notes. Repeat this for two weeks, and the experience you gain as a taster is immense.