My MW Journey
I started my MW journey in 2008. It took me eight years.
I passed theory the first time, but only conditionally — a single paper resit, the old Paper 3, now Paper 4 — which I cleared in 2009. I converted to a full theory pass in 2010, the same year I passed tasting. Then came the part nobody warns you about: I submitted my dissertation in 2011. It was referred. I resubmitted in 2012. Referred again.
If you are in the middle of your own MW journey, wondering why it is taking so long, or nursing a result that did not go the way you hoped, I have been exactly where you are. More than once.
What changed things was a new mentor. In 2015 I began working with Angela Muir MW, around the time the dissertation became the Research Paper — the modern Stage 3. I submitted my RP in 2016 on the single vineyards of Barolo. It passed. I became a Master of Wine on 5th September 2016.
My mentor throughout the exam stage was the late Nicolas Belfrage MW, one of the great figures in Italian wine and a wonderful teacher. Having passed his own MW back in 1980, Nick’s frame of reference was a long way from how the exam actually works today — but I was, and remain, proud to call him both a mentor and a friend. Some years later, Nick Bielak MW became my boss too, when I worked alongside him and Belfrage at Vinexus. Nick taught me a great deal about Italian wine — and, in something of a role reversal, I was able to informally support him through his own Stage 3, after an earlier referral. He passed his Research Paper and became a Master of Wine, and died only a few months later, the same year as Belfrage. I think of both of them often.
My Wine Career
I started in wine in 1991, as an apprentice to my father, Peter Ballantyne. The years since have taken me through Matthew Clark, one of the UK’s major drinks wholesalers, then Armit Wines as a fine wine specialist, and Vinexus, before I set up Noble Grape in 2017 — the independent wine merchant in Cowbridge I still run as my day job.
Mentoring and Coaching
I have been mentoring MW students since 2016, and I have never stopped. I have taught at student seminars every year since — Rust in 2022 and Bolney in 2024 for Stage 1 candidates, Odney in 2025 and Penedès in 2026 for Stage 2 — which means I am not coaching from memory of how the exam used to be. I am in the room every year, seeing exactly what is being asked of candidates now, and I bring that into every coaching conversation.
That combination is the whole point of this coaching scheme. I know what it is to fail a paper, to be referred twice, to need a new mentor before things finally clicked. And I know, from a decade of teaching since, exactly what today’s examiners are looking for. Neither one on its own would be much use to you. Together, they let me coach from lived experience and current insight. I hope they are of real use to you.