Identification of the Wine The Judges' Overall Ranking:
Wine H is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Ovello ........ 1st place
Wine F is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Pora ........ 2nd place
Wine G is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Montestefan ........ 3rd place
Wine E is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Asili ........ 4th place
Wine D is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Muncagota ........ 5th place
Wine B is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Pajè ........ 6th place
Wine C is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Rabaja ........ 7th place
Wine A is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Montefico ........ 8th place
The Judges' Rankings
Judge Wine -> A B C D E F G H
Mike 8 5 7 2 3 6 1 4
Bob 8 5 2 3 7 1 6 4
Jon 6 5 3 8 4 7 2 1
Dick 4 5 8 6 3 2 7 1
Orley 8 7 6 5 4 1 3 2
Zaki 7 6 8 5 4 1 3 2
Wine -> A B C D E F G H
Group Ranking -> 8 6 7 5 4 2 3 1
Votes Against -> 41 33 34 29 25 18 22 14
(6 is the best possible, 48 is the worst)
Here is a measure of the correlation in the preferences of the judges which ranges between 1.0 (perfect correlation) and 0.0 (no correlation):
W = 0.3730
The probability that random chance could be responsible for this correlation is quite small, 0.0283. Most analysts would say that since this probability is less than 0.1, the judges' preferences appear to be strongly related.
We now analyze how each taster's preferences are correlated with the group preference.
A correlation of 1.0 means that the taster's preferences are a perfect predictor of the group's preferences.
A 0.0 means no correlation, while a -1.0 means that the taster has the reverse ranking of the group. This is measured by the correlation R.
Correlation Between the Ranks of each Person With the Average Ranking of Others
Judge Spearman's Rho
Orley 0.9524
Zaki 0.9048
Mike 0.4192
Dick 0.3810
Bob 0.1905
Jon 0.1437
The wines were preferred by the judges in the following order. When the preferences of the judges are strong enough to permit meaningful differentiation among the wines, they are separated by -------------------- and are judged to be significantly different.
1. ........ 1st place Wine H is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Ovello
2. ........ 2nd place Wine F is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Pora
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3. ........ 3rd place Wine G is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Montestefano
4. ........ 4th place Wine E is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Asili
5. ........ 5th place Wine D is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Muncagota
6. ........ 6th place Wine B is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Pajè
7. ........ 7th place Wine C is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Rabaja
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8. ........ 8th place Wine A is 2011 Barbaresco Riserva Montefico
We now test whether the ranksums AS A WHOLE provide a significant ordering. The Friedman Chi-Square value is 15.667. The probability that this could happen by chance is 0.028.
We now undertake a more detailed examination of the pair-wise rank correlations that exist between pairs of judges. First, we present a table in which you can find the correlation for any pair of judges, by finding one of the names in the left hand margin and the other name on top of a column. A second table arranges these correlations in descending order and marks which is significantly positive significantly negative, or not significant. This may allow you to find clusters of judges whose rankings were particularly similar or particularly dissimilar.
Pairwise Rank Correlations
Correlations must exceed in absolute value 0.705 for significance at the 0.05 level, and must exceed 0.626 for significance at the 0.10 level.
Correlation Array for the tasting is:
Mike Bob Jon Dick Orley Zaki
Mike 1.000 -0.095 0.190 -0.119 0.429 0.452
Bob -0.095 1.000 -0.190 -0.048 0.452 0.238
Jon 0.190 -0.190 1.000 0.000 0.238 0.119
Dick -0.119 -0.048 0.000 1.000 0.476 0.643
Orley 0.429 0.452 0.238 0.476 1.000 0.929
Zaki 0.452 0.238 0.119 0.643 0.929 1.000
Pairwise correlations in descending order
0.929 Orley and Zaki Significantly positive
0.643 Dick and Zaki Significantly positive
0.476 Dick and Orley Not significant
0.452 Mike and Zaki Not significant
0.452 Bob and Orley Not significant
0.429 Mike and Orley Not significant
0.238 Bob and Zaki Not significant
0.238 Jon and Orley Not significant
0.190 Mike and Jon Not significant
0.119 Jon and Zaki Not significant
0.000 Jon and Dick Not significant
-0.048 Bob and Dick Not significant
-0.095 Mike and Bob Not significant
-0.119 Mike and Dick Not significant
-0.190 Bob and Jon Not significant
COMMENT:
Overall this was a lot of fun, tasting 8 of the grand crus of Barbaresco from a single year. The consensus was that these wines , not surprisingly, were similar enough to be characterized as coming from the same area without any identifying information. This tasting was interesting because the wines were sold by the Produttori as a complete set. All are vinified and aged identically — fermentation at 30°C with 28 days of skin contact, followed by at least 30 months in large (25–50 hl) oak casks — so that each wine expresses its terroir in its purest form. As a result we were effectively evaluating the terroir of the different vineyard sites. Our expectation was that the similarities of the wines would make them difficult to distinguish but somewhat unusually we had 2 clear winners ‘Ovello’ and ‘’Pora’ this may have been helped by the fact that there was one wine the ‘Montefico’ that was flawed.
This is totally a food wine and the wines appeared to become even more approachable as the tasting, along with the Italian cheeses and meats, progressed. These wines are built for the long haul and even given the 15 years age they were quite tight on opening. As a result the wines were decanted 3 hours before sampling and poured 90 minutes before the tasting began.
This was also something of an homage to our departed friend Ed who first introduced many of us to these marvelous wines.
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