Welcome to Dialed In, Esquire’s column bringing you horological happenings and the most essential news from the watch world.
There is perhaps no watchmaker more synonymous with motorsport than TAG Heuer. From the early days of Jack Heuer selling stopwatches to racers at the track to the introduction of entire watch families named for the pursuit—Monaco, Carrera, and, yeah, Formula 1—the Swiss maker has been beloved by speed freaks the world over. It’s only natural, then, that earlier this month TAG Heuer announced (after much speculation and rumormongering) its sponsorship of Formula 1 as part of a larger deal with LVMH and conglomerate stablemates like Louis Vuitton and Moët Hennessy.
Some brands might have been happy to have the requisite signage next to the track. TAG Heuer, on the other hand, decided to rededicate itself to the most emblematic of racing watches: the chronograph. At LVMH Watch Week, it introduced three new iterations of the Carrera as well as a new lineup of Formula 1 watches all bearing the complication.
The Oracle Red Bull Racing edition of the Formula 1.
Let’s start with the latter. With titanium cases and hits of electric blue, lime green, and bright red, the four core models feel right in line with F1 as it is today—all about lightweight functionality without giving up on the “look at me” factor. And though the 44mm case seems out of line with the Formula 1 watch collection’s history—remember, the styles from the ‘80s topped out at 36mm—it wears much smaller than one might expect. Besides, this new design isn’t so much about playing on nostalgia as it is about tapping into the modern ethos of F1. Rounding out the offering is a limited edition with Oracle Red Bull Racing which, in the team colors of red, blue, and yellow, might just be the most fan-friendly of the bunch.
The Carrera in a deep, striking purple.
On the Carrera side, TAG Heuer acolytes get to pick their proverbial poison. Want something precious that blends utility with outright luxury? How about a 39mm glassbox Carrera in steel with 72 diamonds in the flange? It’s available in powdery pink and deep blue. If those don’t strike your fancy, a couple of other Carreras in deep purple might do the trick. The 42mm tourbillon delivers an abundance of Watch Guy points, but to our eye, the 39mm version might be even better (and at about one-fourth the price).
The Carrera Chronosprint x Porsche Rallye in gold.
And then there’s the collab with Porsche. Available in both steel and gold, the black-dial, 42mm Carrera Chronosprint x Porsche Rallye is an homage to an automotive icon and an evolution of the white-dial Chronosprint released in 2023. Like its predecessor, the model takes things even further by, ahem, complicating the chronograph complication. The tachymeter scale is non-linear, and the central seconds hand accelerates rapidly for the first 15 seconds before slowing to circle the dial in a perfect minute. Effectively, that means you can time short increments with a bit more precision thanks to a larger scale over those initial seconds. As a nod to the time it took the Porsche 911 “147” to go from 0 to 100 kmph in Monte Carlo in 1965, the first 8.4 seconds are marked in red. Is it super useful for most of your day-to-day life? No. But it’s really damn cool. Sometimes, that’s enough.
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