Last In, Last Standing
Luke McDonald grabbed the last seat in the Blackout, then knocked off the one, four and two seeds to win the Coonawarra Cup, taking the final on a closest-to-the-vineyard tiebreaker by about 100 km.
Luke McDonald has won the Coonawarra Cup from the very last seat in the Blackout. It was McDonald's first cup, and the knockout spot only came through a three-way tiebreak for the eighth and final seat, won by about 100 km. From there McDonald knocked out top seed PM in the quarter-finals, saw off Tarita Furlan in the semis and beat Keegan Thomson in the final on a closest-to-the-vineyard tiebreaker, by about 100 km.
Keegan Thomson took second and Luke Steele beat Tarita Furlan for third. Fourth place was still enough to lift Furlan to the top of the season ladder.
Round 1
Fourteen players took their seats in Sue Bell's shearing shed at Bellwether for the fourth of the season's five Regional Cups. Round 1 is the options game: five wines poured blind, five multiple-choice questions on each (Old World or New World, country, region, grape and vintage) and 25 points on the table. Each call is marked right or wrong before the next one opens.
And what a sharp room it was. The fourteen landed 239 of the 350 calls, or 68%, the best of the season. That nudges past the Adelaide Hills (67%) and leaves the Barossa (58%) and Clare (55%) well behind.
PM set the pace with 22 out of 25, the top score of the day. Keegan Thomson and Lauren Hansen were next on 20, and Tarita Furlan took the fourth seed on 19 after beating Maddie LeMire, also on 19, in a tiebreak. Those four went straight through to the Blackout.
Luke McDonald finished Round 1 on 16, six points behind PM and a touch under the room's average.
How the Room Read the Wines
The Round 1 line-up, in pour order, with how the room went on each.
Wine 1 · Brokenwood Beechworth Pinot Gris 2026. 42 of 70 calls right. Five players placed it in Beechworth and six went for the King Valley. Only five found Pinot Gris, with six calling it Riesling.
- Pinot Gris5 ✓
- Riesling6
- Chardonnay3
Wine 2 · Wynns Black Label Messenger Chardonnay 2024. A Coonawarra local, and 53 of 70 calls right. Thirteen of the fourteen called Chardonnay and thirteen nailed the 2024 vintage, but half the room had it down as European. And at a Coonawarra cup, only six put the local wine in Coonawarra.
Wine 3 · Rouge Homme Richardson's Red Block 1993. A Coonawarra Cabernet blend, and the wine that won Rouge Homme the 1994 Jimmy Watson Trophy. It was the toughest wine of the day at 40 of 70. Ten players found Coonawarra and eleven called the Cabernet-dominant blend, but the vintage beat nearly everyone. Nine said 1991 and only three landed on 1993.
Wine 4 · Langmeil Valley Floor Shiraz 2023. A Barossa Valley Shiraz, and 47 of 70 calls right. Eight players sent it to the wrong side of Adelaide and put it in McLaren Vale. Three said Heathcote and only three found the Barossa.
Wine 5 · Geoff Merrill Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 1996. Poured from magnum, and the best-read wine of the day at 57 of 70. All fourteen players called Cabernet. Seven got the 1996 vintage and five went for 1998.
Across all five wines, region was the killer again with 35 of 70 right, exactly half. Vintage wasn't far behind on 40.
Round 2
Round 2 is trivia on your phone, and it carries no ladder points. It's all about the last four seats in the Blackout. Your Round 2 score goes on top of your Round 1 score, and the four best totals among the players not already through take seeds five to eight.
Tarita Furlan and Luke Steele both went a perfect 15 from 15. Furlan was already through, but the perfect round lifted Steele to 31 and the six seed. Maddie LeMire also finished on 31 and took the five seed, and Matilda Innes grabbed the seven seed on 30.
That left one seat and three players locked on 29: Adam T., Federica Marzetti and Luke McDonald. It went to a closest-to-the-vineyard tiebreak, and McDonald won it by about 100 km.
The Blackout
The Blackout is the knockout. The top eight go head to head, one wine per match, tasted from black glasses so nobody can see the colour.
McDonald came out swinging, knocking out top seed PM, the best scorer in Round 1, in the first quarter-final. Tarita Furlan beat Maddie LeMire for the second time that day, Luke Steele knocked out three seed Lauren Hansen and Keegan Thomson got past Matilda Innes.
The semi-finals went to McDonald and Thomson. McDonald beat Furlan, and Thomson ended Steele's run. Steele bounced back to beat Furlan in the playoff for third.
So the final was the eight seed against the two, McDonald against Thomson, over a Wendouree Cabernet Sauvignon 2023 from the Clare Valley. The wine couldn't split them, so it went to a tiebreaker: one more wine in two black glasses, and whoever picks the place closest to the vineyard wins. McDonald won it by about 100 km. No lower seed has won a cup this season.
Every match in the Blackout gets its own wine. This is what went into the black glasses:
- Quarter-finals: Schloss Gobelsburg Ried Renner Grüner Veltliner 2021 from Kamptal in Austria, Ricca Terra Una Vita Grenache Blanc 2024 from the Riverland, Ca' Viola Dolcetto d'Alba Vilot 2021 from Piedmont and Château Nénin Pomerol 2021 from Bordeaux
- Semi-finals: Katnook Estate Odyssey Cabernet Sauvignon 2004 from Coonawarra and Langmeil Jackman's Cabernet Sauvignon 2016 from the Barossa
- Third place: Domaine La Pigeade Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise 2025 from the Rhône
- The final: Wendouree Cabernet Sauvignon 2023 from the Clare Valley
What It's Worth
What a debut. McDonald banked 15 points for playing, 16 for Round 1 and 100 for the win, a cool 131 from one afternoon. That puts McDonald equal sixth on the season ladder, level with last year's champion Stefan Sancin, who took exactly the same 131 home from the Hills.
The bigger prize is the Free Run, an automatic seat at the $5,000 Grand Final at Bottle Shock in Gumeracha on Saturday 5 December. Roberta Ruotolo won one at Clare, Stefan Sancin at the Hills and Piper de Raadt in the Barossa. Luke McDonald now has the fourth.
Tarita Furlan's fourth place was worth 74 points on the day, and that's enough to take the lead on the season ladder with 152. Piper de Raadt is next on 144, then Simone C. on 143, Siyuan Hua on 142 and Topsi W. on 140.
One Cup Left
Eight players at Bellwether put a Barossa Shiraz in McLaren Vale. On Saturday 14 November the league heads there for real.
The McLaren Vale Cup is at Angove McLaren Vale, 117 Chalk Hill Road. It's the last cup of the season and the last Free Run, and it's $25 to play and free to watch. The rest of the Grand Final field is the top 19 on season points, so every point in McLaren Vale counts.
Grab your seat at bottleshock.tv/league/cups.