Wine Salon 2025: Record number of wines competed for the gold medal

The road to the Salon is long and not at all easy. After all, each gold medalist was successively subjected to three evaluations and the golden hundred came from a record 2825 wines entered at the beginning of the competition. From the sub-regional rounds, a still quite generous 1593 wines were entered into the first national round. The strictest filter of professional tasters, but also, for example, chemical analysesThe most severe scrutiny came later, when only 400 finalists had the opportunity to win the top prize.

The golden hundred came from 2825 wines

"The Wine Salon is rightly described as an imaginary paradise for wine lovers, because on the one hand, thanks to its uncompromising system, it guarantees theIt also takes into account the uniqueness of the wine regions of the Czech Republic, our rich varietal composition and wine-making handwriting. Every visit to the tasting exhibition of the Valtice Chateau gives you the opportunity to get a comprehensive picture of how and what kind of wines are made in our country.," said Petr Gondáš, manager of the Wine Salon from the National Wine Centre, which organizes the competition and also manages the tasting exhibition. "Keep an eye on your favourite winemakers to see if they were lucky this year and made it into the golden hundred of this year's collection. Not only in the Wine Salon itself, but also in shops and wine shops, on winemakers' e-shops and websites, and in restaurants, these wines can be recognised by their golden Salon of Wines 2025 medals stuck on the wine bottles and it is good that our top-rated wines can be enjoyed by everyone," he added.

The winners of each category

Champion of the competition and winner of Category A - Dry White Wines

Riesling, late harvest, 2022, no. 2237 - Ing. Miroslav Volařík

Winner of category B - White wines semi-dry and semi-sweet

FRESH Riesling, Moravian Land Wine, 2019, No. 22 - VINAŘSTVÍ POD OŘECHY s.r.o.

Winner of category C - Sweet wines

Pálava, selection of onions, 2021, no. 2137 - Ing. Miroslav Volařík

Winner of category D - Pink wines and clarets

Tercie, cabinet wine, 2023, no. 1023 - VÍNO J.STÁVEK

Winner of category E - Red dry wines

Pinot No. 522 - Vinařství Svoboda

Winner of category G - Quality sparkling wines

Riesling, quality sparkling wine, 2022, No 3006/23 - Mikulica Winery

The award for the best wine collection went to Hanzel Winery, s.r.o.

The collection of 100 wines with the gold medal of the Wine Salon 2025 includes 62 winemakers and wine companies. The largest representation is Hanzel Winery (5 wines) followed by Ing. Miroslav Volařík, Štěpán Maňák and DAVINUS (4 wines). The largest number of the total 22 varieties are traditionally represented by Riesling (18), Riesling Walnut (9) and for the first time ever Pálava (8) is also among the three most frequent varieties, followed by Pinot Blanc (7) and Tramin red (7). The most common red wine is Pinot Noir (6).

The 25th anniversary year

This year's 25th anniversary edition 25th edition of the competition was held in the established three-round format, where during the first phase the tasters judge the wines ofin the individual Moravian wine sub-regions (Znojemská, Mikulovská, Velkopavlovická, Slovácká) and in the Bohemia wine region. Two national rounds of evaluation follow, which will determine the composition of the Wine Salon for the following year, the Champion and the category winners.

The competition itself is followed from February by a year-long tasting exhibition of the best 100 wines in the historic cellar of the Valtice Chateau. Here it is possible to taste the best wines of the year through several types of tasting programmes, including 'free tasting', sommelier-led programmes and individual tasting from a presentation machine. The Wine Salon's tasting exhibition opens on 1 February 2025 and will welcome visitors again almost until Christmas.

In addition to the hundred best wines, awarded according to the statute with the gold medal of the Wine Salon of the Czech Republic 2025, the committee also awarded silver medals (for wines that advanced to the second round of evaluation and received a minimum of 84 points). The total number of medals awarded is limited to a maximum of 30% of the number of wines entered in the first round.

The complete list of wines awarded gold and silver medals and statistics for the current competition can be found in the downloadable file.

The National Wine Centre also provides award-winning wineries and winemakers with specially designed graphics that they can useuse to showcase this achievement on their social media or website.

The Wine Salon - the national wine competition of the Czech Republic is the highest and largest wine competition in the Czech Republic. It is organized by the National Wine Centre, o.p.s. The patronage of the Wine Salon - National Wine Competition 2025 was taken over by the Governor of the South Moravian Region Mgr. Jan Grolich and Minister of Agriculture Mgr. Marek Výborný.

More information can be found at www.salonvin.cz and www.narodnisoutezvin.cz.