Sportoletti villa fidelia rosso 2006
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However fame and fortune never led this family business to lose touch with its roots and they always ensured supplies of their sought after wines were available to local customers and visitors to the vineyard.
SPORTOLETTI VILLA FIDELIA ROSSO 2006 PROFESSIONAL
Fame was assured and in subsequent years the Sportolettis invested heavily in modernising their production facilities and visitors today will be impressed by the modern, efficient and professional setup.
![sportoletti villa fidelia rosso 2006 sportoletti villa fidelia rosso 2006](https://www.idealwine.com/fr/images/etiq/113697.jpg)
1999 also coincided with one the best Umbrian harvests in a generation, and American wine guru, Robert Parker, awarded the Villa Fidelia vintage from that year a staggering 96 points. However from a business point of view it was a master-stroke American and Japanese markets take some persuading to go with the unfamiliar, but the new Villa Fidelia Rosso produced a wine familiar in its make-up, but undeniably Umbrian in its terroir. From a purely selfish point of view I regret the change of blend the unusual inclusion of Pinot Noir produced a wonderful, distinctive wine and I regret its passing. Brave enough to take on advice from an external consultant, they progressively moved focus towards quality, removed the lower grade wines from their range, and relaunched their flagship wine as a Bordeaux look-a-like replacing the Pinot Noir with Cabernet Franc. Remo and Ernesto Sportoletti have their soul in Umbrian tradition, but are very creative and ambitious winemakers. I didn't know it at the time but that year Sportoletti were on the cusp of tremendous changes.
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I bought a case of Villa Fidelia Rosso 1997, a blend of Merlot, Carbernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir to this day I believe it is the best case of wine I have ever bought. In those days it was a much more rustic operation than today but I can remember vividly the passion that Remo Sportoletti showed as he took my friends and I round the production facilities, and pride he took in describing the wines they were producing at that time. Consulting oenologist Riccardo Cotarella oversees winemaking, but these delicious wines stand out for the qualities of the raw materials as much as they do for what goes on in the cellar.I visited the Sportoletti vineyard for the first time in 1999. Sportoletti is one of Umbria’s leading properties. It’s nice to see Sportoletti back in the US market. Specific clones of Sangiovese that provide a lower yield but are much richer in color were also chosen, the same holding true for their Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. The Merlot they grow is a particular massale clone that was selected and propagated from an old vine that had been on the property for fifty years and which, over the years, has given rise to one of their most successful wines. Vines currently cultivated include the indigenous Grechetto, for which they chose the G5 clone, a lower yielding yet more characteristic strain. For the reserve wines, a first harvest of the grapes is carried out while the grapes are just beginning to ripen, in order to obtain an average yield of 1 Kg of grapes per plant. With 5,000 vines per hectare, they are able to control the number of buds and consequently the productivity of the vines. They regularly replant their vines and cultivate them using the spur pruning system and high density planting. In 1998, the company decided to join forces with the highly esteemed agronomic and oenological consultant Riccardo Cotarella, thus marking the start of a highly successful professional collaboration as well as a valued friendship.
SPORTOLETTI VILLA FIDELIA ROSSO 2006 FULL
From that point on, they began a long journey in pursuit of the perfect balance between innovation and tradition, endeavoring to unleash the full potential of their terroir – situated on the hills between Spello and Assisi – where they now own 20 hectares of vineyards from which they produce an average of 200,000 bottles per year. With great reverence for the teachings of their father Vittorio, they began to bottle wines under their own label. In the late 1970s, brothers Ernesto and Remo turned their attention exclusively to winemaking. The Sportoletti family has been passionately dedicated to producing wine in Umbria for generations.