Best Pinot for Decades

After one of the most difficult growing seasons in the Tasmanian wine industry's 70-year history, local winemakers had something to celebrate this week with the release of results from the 2026 Australian Pinot Noir Challenge held last month.

Tasmanian producers blitzed the field in this year's judging, with ten of the event's 22 gold medal wines having been produced from local vineyards.

The Tasmanian regional trophy winner and national trophy winner of the 2026 Australian Pinot Noir Challenge was the 2025 Decades Pinot Noir. The results were announced on 1 October 2026.

The winning Decades wine was grown and made by longtime friends Steve Flamsteed (winemaker, pictured) and Brad Rogers (craft brewer and co-founder of Stone & Wood Brewing Company).

The annual event is conducted by the Mornington Peninsula Vignerons Association. It brings together premium Pinot Noirs from throughout Australia. Wines are organised into classes according to vintage and region of origin and judged blind by a panel of 11 judges and associates.

Some 321 wines were tasted and assessed by the judging panel:

• Tom Carson (chair of judges and Yabby Lake chief winemaker)
• Michael Downer (winemaker, Murdoch Hill)
• Brendan Hawker (senior winemaker, Yering Station)
• Imogen Dillon (head winemaker, Ten Minutes by Tractor)
• Tillie Johnson (winemaker, Tillie J. Wines)
• Adam Cotterall (certified sommelier, wine educator and wine buyer)
• Leanne Altmann (certified sommelier, certified wine educator) 

This year's associates were Charlie Warne, Thomas Borghesi, Grace Jiranek and Matthew Lugg.

Regional winners in 2026:

• Tasmania: 2025 Decades Pinot Noir
• Mornington Peninsula: 2025 Merli Pinot Noir
• Yarra Valley: 2025 Oakridge Vineyard Series Hazeldene Pinot Noir
• Gippsland: 2025 Dirty Three Wines 'Dirt 2' Pinot Noir
• Sunbury: 2025 Marnong Estate Weatherstone Single Vineyard Pinot Noir
• Great Western: 2025 Best's Great Western Pinot Noir
• Macedon Ranges: 2024 Curly Flat Estate Pinot Noir
• Mount Barker, WA: 2025 Marchand & Burch Village Pinot Noir 

Tasmania exhibited 86 of the competition's 321 wines (27 percent) and won 45 percent of the gold medals awarded. Seven of the 10 Tasmanian gold medal wines were grown or made in the Coal River Valley.

Tasmanian gold medal winners in 2026:

• 2025 Bell & Gong Valleyfield Vineyard Pinot Noir
• 2025 Lowestoft Estate Pinot Noir
• 2025 Giant Steps Coal River Valley Pinot Noir
• 2025 Lowestoft Estate Single Vineyard Jacoben Pinot Noir
• 2025 Clarence House Estate Block 1 Pinot Noir
• 2025 Decades Pinot Noir
• 2024 Gala Estate 'Constable Amos' Grand Reserve Pinot Noir
• 2024 Gala Estate 'Reverend Dove' Reserve Pinot Noir
• 2024 Lowestoft Estate La Maison Pinot Noir
• 2024 Lowestoft Estate Single Vineyard Jacoben Pinot Noir

Six of Tasmania's gold medal winners were made by the winemaking team at Fogarty Hall's Cambridge facility outside Hobart.

Fogarty Hall was the country's most awarded wine producer last year, taking on Australian capital city wine shows as well as the prestigious Decanter World Wine Awards and the International Wine & Spirit Competition. In total, the company won 40 trophies and 126 gold medals in 2025.

The Australian Pinot Noir Challenge was first held in 2017 and has been judged nine times. Six of its nine national trophies have been awarded to Tasmanian wines:

National trophy winners since 2017:

• 2026: 2025 Decades Pinot Noir (Tasmania)
• 2025: 2024 Giant Steps Applejack Vineyard Pinot Noir (Yarra Valley)
• 2024: 2023 Bremley Coal River Pinot Noir (Tasmania )
• 2023: 2022 Meadowbank Pinot Noir (Tasmania)
• 2022: 2021 Clarence House Block 1 Pinot Noir (Tasmania)
• 2021: 2020 Ossa Pinot Noir (Tasmania)
• 2020: Event not held
• 2019: 2018 Tertini Pinot Noir (Tasmania)
• 2018: 2017 Handpicked Collection Pinot Noir (Mornington Peninsula)
• 2017: 2016 Yes Said the Seal Pinot Noir (Geelong)

"With 320 entries from 20 regions across Australia represented, this year's Challenge showcased the exceptional quality of the 2025 vintage and the strength of Australian Pinot Noir," says chair of judges Tom Carson.

"Against that outstanding field, the 2025 Decades Pinot Noir from Tasmania's Coal River Valley absolutely captivated the judges from its first showing. Its wonderful aromatics, detail and silky palate carried it through every stage of judging.

"To win the national trophy with only their third release is an extraordinary achievement for Steve Flamsteed and Brad Rogers."

Indeed, Decade's twin trophy wins at the Australian Pinot Noir Challenge highlight a truly remarkable 2026 for the company founded only four years ago. 

The winery was named the Halliday Wine Companion's 2027 Best New Winery back in August, while Flamsteed also received its 2027 Winemaker of the Year award.

"It's an incredible honour to have been selected as the Challenge winner by that exceptional group of judges, out of what would have been a stack of beautiful wines," Flamsteed says.

"Australian Pinot is in such an incredible place right now, and wine shows and events like the Pinot Challenge just push us to keep getting better."

Carson agrees.

"The diversity of Pinot Noir in Australia is a dynamic and ever moving target – viticulture and winemaking is constantly redefining the boundaries of quality – and we are seeing the best ever Pinot Noirs made in Australia right now."

This year's purple patch is a tribute to mateship for the knockabout blokes who both grew up in Queensland and shared a love of live music. Especially Joy Division.

Their friendship began spontaneous fermentation back in 1991 when the two first studied winemaking together at South Australia's Roseworthy Agricultural College.

Decades sprang to life in 2022 when the pair purchased the 30ha Woodlands property on Tea Tree Road, then owned by the Laing family.

Located less than 5km from 10 neighbouring vineyards, this part of the Coal River Valley is effectively its 'dress circle.'

The pair's Decades acquisition included 3ha of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, first planted in 1990 by Woodlands Vineyard founder Maurice Barwick.

Wines produced under its Sexton family ownership in the late 1990s and early 2000s were marketed under the Touchwood label. They included a trophy-winning traditional method sparkling wine.

Flamsteed is a dyed-in-the-wool fan of cool-climate Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.

He became renowned for his artisan winemaking with the varieties during his 18-year stint (2003-2021) at Giant Steps in the Yarra Valley.

In 2016, Flamsteed was named Australian Gourmet Traveller Magazine Winemaker of the Year. In 2019, he was celebrated as the Wine Communicators of Australia 'Victorian Legend of the Vine.'

Decade's Tea Tree site is distinguished by the Coal River Valley's characteristic black cracking clay soils over limestone. The conditions typically support modest vineyard yields, with concentrated fruit flavours framed by fine natural acidity.

The district's long, cool growing season and dry maritime climate favours slow ripening and intensely structured Chardonnay and Pinot Noir.

The vineyard features a north-easterly aspect and is set on a gentle slope that offers some frost mitigation. All vines on the property are cane pruned to a Guyot system of soft pruning.

Flamsteed and Rogers added 3ha of new Pinot Noir plantings to the Decades site in 2023. A further 4ha of vines were planted the following year.

Fruit is hand-picked and processed with the help of nearby contract winemakers.

Last page update: 2 October 2026