Ditton Wine Traders’ fine wine blog

Robert Parker's always revisits his initial scores for a new vintage, usually called the ”in-bottle scores”. Only nobody ever knows when.

It never ceases to amaze me how much power this man has over the wine world. It’s actually quite hilarious. These reviews are important for the trade as it can cause big shifts in prices. So everybody is on his toes at around the time that Parker normally updates his scores (Feb-April). And when the oracle finally speaks, traders are falling over each other to get their hands on any wine that has received an upgrade, resulting in a rather hectic morning. I personally got tens of emails and phone calls asking if my Lafite ’06 is still available at the now very cheap price of £3,200. And a few hours later, normality has returned again – with new price levels. Quite bizar.

Anyway, the revised scores for the Bordeaux 2006 vintage were released Thursday night, with a number of wines receiving significant upgrades on their en primeur score ranges. Courtesy from my friends at Liv-ex, I have stolen this little overview:

As you can see, the big winner is Lafite, now scoring 97 (previously 91-94+) and also a point higher than the far more expensive 2005. Other notable upgrades include Haut Brion with 96 points (92-94+ range) and Ausone with 98 points (95-97 range). In general, wines hit the top end of their original ranges, although none of the potential 100-point wines hit the magic three figures. The score for La Mission Haut Brion (95, was 96-100) is one of the few big names receiving a lower score.

Finally, what we already expected proves true: Mouton’s is the wine of the vintage with 98+: " A sensational effort...utterly profound...clearly the greatest Mouton produced since 1982 and 1986". A potential 100 pointer.

As an afterthought: we list 2 lovely cases of Mouton '86 – a proven 100 pointer with a wide and loyal following – at GBP 4,600. This looks decidedly cheap compared to the 2006 at GBP 5,000.....