The Winery of the Year is now judged by the Senior Jury. The final nine will be announced in early November

The"Senior Jury" is made up of nine knowledgeable experts, three each from the fields of viticulture, cellar management and marketing and trade. They will add their professional evaluation to the documents collected by the 'Junior Jury', made up of students and PhD students from the Faculty of Horticulture at Mendel University in Brno. They visited all 25 participating wineries and collected all the essential information for the next two stages of the evaluation, i.e. the 'Senior Jury' and the 'Expert Committee'.

"This year we have added a blind wine tasting to the whole process. Each nominated winery supplied 3 samples of their wines, which they are convinced will represent them properly," said the President of the Union of Winemakers of the Czech Republic, PhDr. Martin Chlad and added: "The evaluation took place on Thursday 19. The wines were tasted by a jury consisting of the national sommelier Klára Kollárová, last year's absolute champion winemaker Jindřich Kadrnka and the 2022 Oenologist of the Year Kamil Prokeš. Winemaking of the Year is a complex competition where having only top-quality and perfectly prepared wine is not enough to succeed, on the contrary, it is considered a necessary minimum. This blind tasting is only to confirm that this is indeed the case with this year's candidates."

In this year's competition, the "Senior Jury" consists of:

Sales and Marketing

• Martina Fojtů - PR and content manager at the strategic and creative agency AETNA in Brno.
• Filip Bodlák - sommelier and co-founder of the family wine shop Víno do Bodlák
• Michaela Luňáčková - Managing Partner of the Brno-based digital agency Cognito

Viticulture

• Stanislav Škrobák - viticulturist and co-owner of the winery, winner of domestic and international competition in vine cutting
• Lubomír Tichý - chairman of the Dunajovské Kopce wine association, owner of the winery
• Martina Karasová - long-time vineyard manager and renowned viticulturist

Cellar management

• Zbyněk Žiška - chief oenologist of the Bzenec Chateau Winery and Mikrosvín Mikulov Winery, holder of the Enologist of the Year 2020 title in the competition
• Eliška Becková - Enologist of the Year 2018, worked at Volařík Winery, now has her own boutique winery
• Iva Šantavá - oenologist and director of VÍNO BLATEL winery

In the final third round of evaluation then 26.-28. The "Expert Commission" will visit the finalists directly at the individual wineries on 28th and 28th November and will assess the extent to which the finalists meet the competition criteria, thus finally deciding on the winners.

Announcement

The whole evaluation process will be completed on 1. The winners in the three competition categories and the absolute winner of the Winery of the Year 2023 and the Art of Wine will be announced on February 1 at the Brno Observatory and Planetarium. Awards will also be presented - Lomax Enologist of the Year, Achievement of the Year, Prof. Vilém Kraus, CSc. The gala evening will be traditionally hosted by Mr. Marek Eben.

The competition is announced and the title "Winery of the Year" is awarded by the Union of Winegrowers of the Czech Republic in cooperation with the National Wine Centre, with significant support from the Wine Fund of the Czech Republic and the South Moravian Region. The event is organized under the auspices of the Governor Mgr. The general and titular partner is the new e-shop not only with wine Umění vína. The competition is also supported by the Brno Observatory and Planetarium and the Faculty of Horticulture of Mendel University in Brno.

More information can be found at www.vinarstviroku.cz, and the latest events can be followed on the social networks Facebook and Instagram and the YouTube channel.