At this early stage this wine is usually completely impenetrable but even Las Cases managed to show some opulence in this extraordinary vintage. Fruit beat those tannins for once! As usual the colour is almost black, and, like the first growths, this wine is so dense it contrasts with its second wine in its lack of overt message because it is just so massive. On the palate however it is quite unusually round and flattering - amazing for LLC! This is followed by a huge charge of tannin underneath, by no means integrated at the moment. It's extraordinary how 'cool' it tastes. It doesn't taste as tannic as most previous vintages but the analyses belie this apparently. Jean-Hubert Delon says his LLC vines were actually more stressed in 2002 than in 2003. (18+) JANCIS ROBINSON