Practice, Patience & Pinot Noir

By Shaun Tolson

About the same time that Paul Giamatti and Virginia Madsen were lauding the virtues of Pinot Noir in Sideways, professional golfer Cristie Kerr was seriously pondering the pesky grape. The year was 2005, and Kerr was one of the top players on the LPGA Tour—as well as an aspiring winemaker on the side. Despite the challenges involved, she was intent on launching her own wine label and, eventually, tackling the complex varietal. “Expertly crafted California Pinot Noir has been my muse,” Kerr says. “I really like the finesse of the Pinot grape . . . although it is fickle to work with.”

If Kerr sounds like someone who knows what she’s talking about, she does. The two-time major champion and 20-time winner on the LPGA Tour is serious about the wine business—and her wines are taken just as seriously. “The wine hits the palate with stunning purity, full-bodied richness, great penetration and overall equilibrium,” the legendary critic Robert Parker once said of Kerr Cellars’ 2013 Reserve Red. He was no less effusive in his praise for the 2015 vintage. “With good energy and vibrant acidity, this is a stunner. It should drink well for 25 to 30 years.”

More recently, wine critic James Suckling bestowed 96 points to Kerr Cellars’ 2018 Beckstoffer Georges III Cabernet Sauvignon and 97 points to the label’s 2018 Wappo Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon. “A complex and fascinating wine,” he wrote of the latter release.

The patience to wait—and the persistence to keep fighting—has been a cornerstone of Kerr’s successful career in golf. As a player on the LPGA Tour, she made 129 starts before claiming her first victory. She eventually earned 24 professional titles and more than $20 million as a golfer. From her experience—and from her advisors and partners in viticulture—she’s learned that a similarly long view is required in wine. “We have a great product and story,” Kerr remembers being told, “but sometimes it takes time to build a brand.”

Kerr’s wine story started in 2000, during the week of the Samsung World Championship, an LPGA event held at Hiddenbrooke Golf Club in Vallejo, Calif., about 30 miles southeast of Napa Valley. Then 22 years old and already a wine enthusiast, she scheduled her practice rounds in the mornings so she could tour Napa’s finest winemakers in the afternoons, visiting Joseph Phelps

Kerr Cellars produces a Sauvignon Blanc and a variety of red wines that have been hailed by critics including Robert Parker

Vineyards and Staglin Family Vineyard, among others. She finished 16th and earned $14,000 at the tournament that week, but her real takeaway was a passion to pursue a second career—or, as she likes to call it, a “side hustle”— in wine.

A few years later, Kerr began contacting existing wineries, pitching them on a collaboration that would produce the types of wines she loved—refined, complex expressions that drink well young but also offer cellaring potential. After a number of unsuccessful proposals, she met with Suzanne Pride Bryan, co-owner of Pride Mountain Vineyards. Kerr told her she wanted to make a high-quality wine, produced in small quantities, and that she didn’t want to make any money from it. Her family had a history of breast cancer, so she wanted proceeds from the wine to support research into the disease.

Pride Bryan, a breast-cancer survivor herself, immediately committed to the project. One year later, the partners bought out an existing winery and hired winemaker Sally Johnson. They officially launched their label, Curvature Wines, with the release of the 2006 Curvature Cabernet Sauvignon, a wine that Kerr still calls “her baby.”

“It would be easy for someone in her position to simply fund a brand from a distance, but she is very hands-on in every aspect of Curvature,” Johnson says. “Possibly because she is a competitor at heart, she sets benchmarks and goals for herself in order to measure her progress in the ‘sport’ of wine knowledge. The fact that she approaches wine in this systematic way led her to study for—and pass—the certified sommelier exam.”

To further her footprint in wine, Kerr launched Kerr Cellars in 2013, hiring Helen Keplinger as winemaker. The label finally brought to fruition Kerr’s calling to make Pinot Noir.

Kerr’s enthusiasm for the craft and her desire to be involved—she refers to herself as her brands’ “chief tasting officer”—has no doubt enhanced her ventures’ successes to date. However, she is quick to acknowledge those who have guided her along the way, including Pride Bryan, Johnson, Keplinger, Kathryn Walt Hall of Hall Wines and Marvin Shanken, the publisher and editor of Wine Spectator magazine. Each of them, like a coach on the golf course or practice range, has provided crucial advice and encouragement during Kerr’s winemaking journey.

As with golf, Kerr is confident that practice—and patience—will continue to pay off in the form of winning scores. “In many ways, I’ve had the perfect performance in a major championship, winning by 12 shots,” she says, referencing her victory at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship in 2010. “It would be equally amazing to achieve a perfect score in the wine world—even more so, maybe, since it depends on the opinions of others. So chasing the perfect score is definitely a goal of mine.”

Cristie Kerr, Connoisseur

Cristie Kerr is not one of those celebrities who simply slaps her name on a label and calls it her own. She is a true student of wine, who has passed the level-one sommelier certification test and has compiled an impressive collection of vintages beyond her own Curvature and Kerr Cellars labels. Here, a peek inside her personal preferences and cellar shelves.

What are some of your go-to wines?

[Staglin Family Vineyards] Cabernets are some of the best I have had. I always feel like I am buying a piece of Napa history when I go there. Wines like Littorai, Massican, Rivers-Marie are my Pinot Noir favorites, and are always great expressions. At a restaurant, I try to order things less common, like Austrian and German wines. I do love all white-wine varietals as well as heavier Cabernet Sauvignon. I’m a Libra . . . it’s hard to get a straight answer!

Your personal wine cellar is pretty expansive. Which bottles in it are the most special to you? Some of the more special bottles I have were gifts from other winemakers, like a three-liter bottle of Grgich Hills Estate 2002 Cabernet Sauvignon that winemaker Ivo Jeramaz gave to me and my husband at our wedding. There are special bottles that I was gifted when I won the U.S. Open, like a bottle of the Poet Meritage by winemaker Mitch Cosentino or a bottle of Angels’ Peak given to me by Tony Terlato. I also have a bottle of Hattrick Cabernet Sauvignon from NHL star Igor Larionov, and wines from Wayne Gretzky and Ernie Els. Some of these may not be valuable in collectors’ circles, but they have a special place in my cellar and in my heart.

As far as collectible wines go, what are a few of your trophy bottles?

I do collect some older Burgundy and Bordeaux wines and, of course, some older California Cabernet Sauvignon, but we mostly have daily drinking wines around. Some of my collectible bottles include a 2001–2005 vertical of Insignia; a 2001–2005 vertical of Opus One; a three-liter bottle of 2007 Masseto Toscana; 2012 Hundred Acre ‘Ark Vineyard’ Cabernet Sauvignon; 2005 Chateau Pavie, Saint-Emilion Grand Cru; and the sixth bottling of Abacus Cabernet Sauvignon by ZD Wines.