Bordeaux Wine Enthusiasts

The wines were presented blind, with results as follows. I've also included the order in which the wines were presented, for those with ADD or excessive BAC at the time the details were revealed.

2000 vs. 2002
First place, by a wide margin:
2000 Léoville Poyferré
This was wine #2

Second place:
2000 Pichon Baron
This was wine #6

Third place:
2002 Pichon Baron
This was wine #3

Fourth place:
2002 Léoville Poyferré
This was wine #4

Fifth place:
2002 Calon Segur
This was wine #1

Sixth place:
2000 Calon Segur
This was wine #5

1989 Pichon Baron vs. Lynch Bages:
Pichon Baron (Wine A): 11 votes
Lynch Bages (Wine B): 17 votes

I did terribly, as usual, but both Lucie (who got twice as many points and I agreed that the top three wines were 2,6, & 4, although we had different rankings of these. I thought the 2000 Baron was the best because it had by far the best bouquet. That is what set it apart from the 2000 LP and the 2002 PB.

Calon Segur is almost as slow to come around as Montrose. Patience will be rewarded. 02 Poyferre has shown very well at dinners we have had despite its youth.

For me the 89 Lynch Bages was clearly superior to the 89 Pichon Baron. Jim was at my table, but he did not say which was the Lynch even if he claimed to know. I found it quite remarkable that he did not campaign. Perhaps he agreed with me that wine B was clearly better than wine A and figured that wine B would win easily.

Indeed, Bill, in the end I was curious to see what the results would be, I didn't lobby for a single vote, although I had a few available by text message if necessary!
I was pretty confident about the '89 Lynch being choice B right from the beginning, but I had no clue about the 2002/2000 part.
We agreed that number 2, the '00 Leoville Poyferre, was the classiest of the bunch.
And also agreed that #6 had the most dramatic nose, although I was surprised that it ended up being the 2000 Baron because I thought it was more of an exotic bouquet than what I might have expected from Pauillac. That one had me really confused because I thought the nose was Cos-like but, as Bill and I were discussing, it would be unlikely that a young Calon Segur would be so flamboyant on the nose.

Effie rated the wines in the same order as the group did as a whole.
2000 Sociando was definitely the class of the group.
They were all delicious, though, I thought the 2002s did nothing to embarass themselves.
And I also loved the 2000s because they were not by any means over the top.
I think they are going to be classic and long-lived.

I was trying to pair the wines by estate (in a Highlights magazine "which of these are alike" kind of a way, suiting my mental abilities as I was still recovering from Friday evening), and I ended up with an unnaturally sorted order where I thought 1 and 2, 3 and 4, and 5 and 6 were the estate pairs. Looking back, none of these were actually siblings. What a shocker!!!!

But I played the anti-BD card (as everyone knows is my wont) and voted for my favorite wines all being from the 2000 vintage which was correct for all but the 2002 Leo- Poyferré (which is a wine I will be looking for at the auctions.)

All in all, an entertaining and educational exercise. Perhaps hm$ is onto something about forming a 401(c)3 to treat all of our wine contributions at the convention as donations to an educational experience. Who's up for a trip to the Cayman's to create the trust??? ((cool sunglasses smilie))

I regret that i was not able to join the festivities, but it certainly sounds like it was a wonderful event.
I was very pleased to read that 2000 Leoville Poyferre was so well received. A friend and i organized a 2000 Bordeaux horizontal tasting two summers ago, and the Poyferre was my favorite wine of the night, although it promised to get even better. That tasting included the following 2000s:
Clerc Milon
Larrivet Haut Brion
Leoville Poyferre
Lafon Rochet
Troplong Mondot
Rouget
d'Issan
La Tour Carnet
Pavillon Rouge

2000 Doisy-Vedrines

My notes indicate that i gave the Leoville Poyferre a fabulous 97 points. The only wine that was close was the Troplong Mondot. Now that i look back on the competition, I guess I am not surprised with my conclusions, since I didn't open some other great 2000s - like Lynch Bages, Pichon Baron, Gruaud Larose, La Fleur Petrus, Brane Cantenac, GPL and Leoville Barton - which I have in storage. I guess I'll have to do a broader 2000 horizontal in a few years to see whether the Poyferre is still the king in that company.

There's a reason, HBL, why Leoville Poyferre is the only two time BWE wine of the year award dinner.