San Guido Estate Director Carlo Paoli describes 2017 as a very challenging year, with unrelenting heat, little rain and no diurnal shifts. Conditions were especially hard for vineyards in the plains at the end of July, when scirocco winds came in from the ocean. For the flagship Sassicaia, Paoli emphasized older hillside vineyards, mostly planted in the 1970s and 1980s, with older style vineyard architecture that had the benefit of encouraging air circulation. Two thousand eighteen presented a very different set of conditions. It was generally a cool year. A sharp drop in temperatures at the end of August followed by a sudden burst of heat halted ripening in the Merlot for nearly two week and led to a harvest around September 12 and 13 instead of the end of August. Cool weather and rain at the end of the growing season resulted in Cabernet Sauvignon with a bit less body and overall structure than is the norm.
