When Wine Is a Marathon, Not a Sprint

Tom Gilbey is a genius wine merchant, but now he is also a certified viral sensation! While running the London Marathon this week, Gilbey stopped to blind tasting a new wine at each mile. The bit was filmed, uploaded to his TikTok account where he now has 117k followers, and the video currently has 4.4million views at time of publishing. In addition to getting all the new eyes, Gilbey was able to raise more than £13,000 for The Sobell House Hospice Charity.

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During the 26.2 mile marathon, Gilbey tasted 25 wines without knowing what they were. He got 7 fully correct, 4 wrong, and 14 he got "mostly right" (his words!) For those of you familiar with blind tasting, it's a skill set sommeliers and wine professionals hone over time, using muscle memory from tasting wines during their career and are able to run through a process of elimination to ultimately guess grape variety, origin, vintage, and even producer. It's a special skill, sometimes referred to as a parlor trick.

Wines ranged from bottled to canned wine, some purchased at a gas station liquor store, and all the way up to a $50 Barolo. Gilbey admittedly did drink some of the wines if he deemed them good, but wines he wasn't a fan of ended up on the road. He finished the marathon with a time of 4 hours, 41 minutes including the pit stops to blind taste wines, and he celebrated the finish with a glass of Champagne.

Tom Gilbey has spent his whole working life in wine. From his start in winemaking to running a flagship city wine merchant, Gilbey's unwavering passion for wine is part of the DNA of his business and shines through in every wine he and his team promote, as well as every wine event they host.

Visit tomgilbey.com to learn more.