The competition involved 600 wines in 16 classes from the best new world wine producers representing the United States, Canada, Chile, New Zealand, South Africa and Australia.

Coolangatta Estate cellar door manager Ben Bishop said just being invited to participate is considered a major achievement because you are being chosen to represent Australia.

Mr Bishop said the international wine competition chooses one wine writer/judge in each country to submit 100 wines.

For Australia that was Huon Hooke who selected two Coolangatta semillons to represent the nation. Both impressed the judges during a giant blind wine tasting.

The two Coolangatta Estate semillons Mr Hooke chose for the global challenge were Coolangatta Estate's 2011 Wollstonecraft Semillon which won the trophy for the 'Best Other White Varieties'.

And Coolangatta Estate's 2015 Wollstonecraft Semillon won Runner Up Double Gold Medal' in the same class.

So the Shoalhaven Heads' vineyard not only won Australia's only trophy it took first and second place with its semillons in the category they were entered.

That result helped Australia finish second overall in the medal count for the honour of becoming top nation.

That title was taken out by challenge was taken out by New Zealand.

"It was great for us to not only represent the nation but also represent the Shoalhaven," Mr Bishop said.

"We were also recently fortunate enough to get Best White of Show at Forbes for our new riesling".

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