Consorzio del Vino
Brunello di Montalcino®

27th BENVENUTO BRUNELLO: THE 2018 VINTAGE AS SEEN BY CHAMPION SPORTSMAN ALEX ZANARDI

 

16/02/2019

 

The four winners of the Leccio d’Oro: Enoteca di Ghino of Pienza, Reale Restaurant of Castel di Sangro, Hedonism Wines of London and Ozio Restaurant of Tokyo

 

27th BENVENUTO BRUNELLO: THE 2018 VINTAGE 

AS SEEN BY CHAMPION SPORTSMAN ALEX ZANARDI

 

Today we are presenting the 2018 vintage: experts have assigned it four stars, depicted on the celebratory tile created by champion sportsman Alex Zanardi. 

“Unlike when I race, I savour Brunello slowly.”

 

Montalcino, 16 February 2019 – The leading figure at Benvenuto Brunello 2019 today is Alex Zanardi, creator of the tile in celebration of the 2018 vintage, added to the wall of Montalcino Town Hall, where the open-air collection is enriched every year by a new and prestigious signature.

 

“When I’m eating, I let the experts guide me, but I love red wine with a certain body, like Brunello di Montalcino, to be enjoyed slowly”. While speed is what has made him a sporting champion, with a glass of Brunello di Montalcino, Alex Zanardi likes to take things slowly, dedicating the time necessary to savour it to the full.

A sense of meditation and contemplation of the beauty and goodness echoed in the tile created by Zanardi, with a rainbow ideally joining the vineyards and the sky lit up by four stars. This is the number awarded to this year’s vintage: a production that should return to the historical average in terms of quantity.

 

But, for Zanardi, the four stars also represent four thoughts, which mark the outline of the astral stars, capable of summing up his philosophy and his approach to life, in which “standing still gets you nowhere”, because luck offers us the best opportunities “when it meets talent”. This is why Zanardi’s tile reads: “curiosity lights the way”, making it necessary to fill up our existence “with great attempts to do the things we love to the best of our ability.

 

As Zanardi himself explains, “A glass of wine can seal a moment, an emotion, which I personally see almost automatically shared with a friend. And if the wine in the glass is Brunello di Montalcino, the friend will definitely be a good friend, one you share memories and passions with. Looking out over the horizon of a beautiful sunset and talking about the way you see life and the things you think you’ve understood.

This is what I wanted to put into the tile in celebration of the 2018 vintage. And… thank you: I am greatly honoured to have been given the opportunity to do so”.

 

Commitment, dedication and passion. These are the qualities that have always characterised Zanardi and which also characterise the work of Montalcino’s winegrowers and oenologists, capable of protecting the grapes in the vineyards against climatic stress, to guarantee the finest possible quality while respecting the identity that the world associates with Brunello di Montalcino. “As Zanardi teaches us in sport, to achieve results worthy of our products we have to make a constant commitment, a sacrifice fuelled by passion for our wines.” says Consortium Chairman, Patrizio Cencioni. “And it is an honour for us to flank the 2018 vintage with another great Italian name, known and loved the world over, that of Alex Zanardi”

 

Presented on this date, like every other year, the Leccio d’Oro 2019 awards are assigned to the restaurant and the wine store, in the “Italian” and “Foreign” categories, with the best wine list, or with a wide, exclusive and representative range of Brunello and other wines of  Montalcino. This year’s winners are Enoteca di Ghino of Pienza (Siena) for the “Italian wine store” category, the Reale Restaurant of Castel di Sangro (L’Aquila) for the “Italian  restaurant” category, Hedonism Wines of London for the “foreign wine store” category and the Ozio restaurant of Tokyo for the “foreign restaurant” category.