How many licks does it take?

Towards the end of previously cited article from the San Francisco Chronicle, the number of wines and method of judging is touched upon. Seeing as I have never been invited to participate as a judge (maybe it has something to do with my lack of opinion), this may very well be par for the course. If so, I suggest that you take the results from any 'competition' with a grain of salt:

"A 25-member panel of judges chaired by Brian Croser, founder of Petaluma winery in Piccadilly, South Australia, assesses about 180 wines per day. Each judge tastes approximately 540 wines."

Okay then, let's 'do' the numbers. According to the host website , The 2005 Macquarie Bank Sydney Royal Wine Show judging will take place from Monday 7 to Thursday 10 February 2005. I hope it is safe to assume that the .04 version was on a similar schedule. How long is a reasonable period for judging 'per day'? I would think 6 hours to be unimaginable. 8 hours would be ridiculous. For the sake of argument, let's go with the 8 hour program.

180 wines/8 hours = 22.5 wines per hour

60 minutes/22.5 wines = 2.66 minutes per wine

Even affording the judges 'expert' status, they are still human, right? How is it possible to accurately critique and qualify any wine, much less 180 in less than 3 minutes? (For the record, the 6 hour program brings the time down to 2 minutes per wine) And what about their 'collective' tongue. I would think to be the oral equivalent of 'Forty Miles of Bad Road' (Duane Eddy reference intentional).

And then to do this for 4 days in a row?!?!

It's unbelievable...I don't believe it.