Earlier ripening Pomerol took the full blast of this hot, dry year.

Earlier ripening Pomerol took the full blast of this hot, dry year. The vine stressed and blocked in zones of sandy-gravel soils, the leaves withering and in certain extremes even falling off. Maturity was thus affected resulting in some wines with hard, dry tannins, dilution or occasionally an alcohol ‘burn’. That being said it’s certainly not a disaster as had earlier been predicted. There are few wines with aggressive, vegetal notes and the harvest appears generally clean. Those who worked assiduously in the vineyard have produced attractive fruit, even in the ‘lesser’ terroirs off the Pomerol plateau (Bellegrave, Taillefer). The stars, generally with a greater percentage of clay soils (Petrus, Trotanoy), have produced truly stunning wines. It’s a year to be selective.

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James Lawther MW
James Lawther MW
Decanter Magazine, Bordeaux Expert and DWWA 2019 Regional Chair for Languedoc-Roussillon

James Lawther MW is a contributing editor to Decanter as well as an independent wine writer, lecturer and tour guide based in Bordeaux. He retailed wine at Steven Spurrier's Les Caves de la Madeleine in Paris in the 1980s, and his early career also involved stints as a cellar hand in Bordeaux, Burgundy, Roussillon and Western Australia. In 1993, Lawther became a Master of Wine. He is author of The Heart of Bordeaux and The Finest Wines of Bordeaux, and has contributed to books including Dorling Kindersley’s Wines of the World, Oz Clarke’s Bordeaux and Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book.