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Borna Bošnjak
It’s not typically that you just get the possibility to deliver a digital camera right into a watch model’s archives, and even much less typically do you get almost unbridled entry, led by the model’s personal Heritage Director. However that’s precisely the courtesy TAG Heuer and Nicholas Biebuyck granted us earlier than the opening of the 2025 Method 1 season in Melbourne, taking Andrew and Marcus on a tour of (TAG) Heuer’s historic affect on the quickest sport on the planet. I received’t spoil an excessive amount of, and I’ve no cause to – who higher to inform you these tales than the model’s chief historian and bonafide Method 1 and racing fanatic?
As a Method 1 nerd myself, although, I can’t fairly assist myself however no less than deliver you the highlights. Whereas Heuer’s motorsport timing efforts started with their Rally-Grasp dash-mounted stopwatches, the story actually begins with the Autavia within the late Sixties, worn by the likes of Jochen Rindt and Jo Siffert. The previous remains to be the one driver to ever win a Method 1 championship posthumously (a declare we hope doesn’t repeat), with the star pictured sporting numerous Heuer references alongside his spouse Nina – herself lending her title to a different well-known chronograph that Biebuyck cheekily nods to.
Early Autavias just like the 3646 developed into the ref. 1163, worn by Siffert and coinciding with one other horological story of previous, that of the race to develop the world’s first automated chronograph – however that’s a narrative for an additional time. Biebuyck notes the variations within the Chronomatic-branded 1163s that will later bear “automated chronograph” as a substitute, starting the model’s conquest of the circuit that will occur over the following decade led by their maverick CEO, Jack Heuer.
And the way would Jack Heuer obtain that? That’s the place the Carrera 1158 CHN is available in, which might go on to turn out to be essentially the most recognisable classic Heuer reference exterior maybe solely the Steve McQueen Monaco. With it, Jack Heuer additionally constructed his relationship with Ferrari, beginning as a technical one with Heuer offering important timekeeping tools, and creating within the early Seventies as Ferrari’s calls for rose. Not solely did Ferrari demand the timekeeping instruments at no cost, in addition they requested Heuer to pay their drivers CHF 25,000 every. Jack, the sensible businessman that he was, provided the drivers a free, stable gold Carrera every whereas bringing them to the Heuer manufacturing unit. That watch was the 1158 CHN, after all, and it might go on to turn out to be a revered possession within the paddock, and encourage many future (TAG) Heuers, together with a current Carrera Glassbox.
Whereas Method 1 would see an increase in reputation within the Seventies, Heuer wasn’t fairly so fortunate because of that pesky quartz disaster that at all times pops up once you speak about this decade. By 1979, Heuer was in actual bother, regardless of making some quartz watches within the interval, ultimately falling into the fingers of Piaget in 1982. This possession was short-lived: the story goes that Yves Piaget was sitting subsequent to Akram Ojjeh on a aircraft and struck up a deal for the latter’s TAG group to buy Heuer. A 12 months later, in 1986, this acquisition bore fruit within the form of the TAG Heuer Method 1, a resin-cased, vibrant piece that just about saved the model, and is now a staple within the everlasting assortment. When you look fastidiously, you’ll see simply that this watch was already deliberate earlier than Heuer and TAG merged – the protect on the straps is brief and huge, because it was initially simply meant to say “Heuer”, whereas there was sufficient time to reprint the dials with the right emblem.
All that is only a taster of the wealth of data that Biebuyck shared, with tales about Jacky Ickx, Ryan Gosling, Lewis Hamilton, and extra instructed at size, with the precise watches that these icons wore. Get some snacks, and benefit from the watch, people.
