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  • TAG Carrera Chrono Extreme Sport Collection; Breitling's 32 Watches For 32 NFL Teams; Sinn Brings Back The 156; The Circula x TRTS Collab; GO Has A Massive Dive Chrono; And AP's New Code 11.59

TAG Carrera Chrono Extreme Sport Collection; Breitling's 32 Watches For 32 NFL Teams; Sinn Brings Back The 156; The Circula x TRTS Collab; GO Has A Massive Dive Chrono; And AP's New Code 11.59

Some pretty fun watches today, but my loyalties say that the Circula x TRTS one is the best

Author

Vuk Radic
September 09, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 24 minutes

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. School is starting, which means that the summer is over and I can’t take it easy any more. We’re back to our regular scheduled programming where I just crank out tons of content, and I’m bringing back reviews — there’s a hell of a lot of nice watches lined up until the end of the year and Patreon supporters will get to see the first one tomorrow as an early preview. The rest will get it pretty soon too.

For now, It’s About Time is a fully reader supported publication. If you like this newsletter, want to continue getting it and want even more of my writing, I would love if you could hop on over to Patreon and subscribe. You give me $6 a month, I give you 5 additional longform posts per week which include an overview of interesting watches for sale, early access to reviews (it’s the Seiko x Giugiaro SCED035 "Ripley"), a basic watch school, a look back at a forgotten watch, and a weekend read that looks at the history of horology.

In this issue:

  • TAG Heuer Unveils Very Modern, Racing Inspired, Carrera Chronograph Extreme Sport Collection

  • Breitling Launches 32 New References Of The Chronomat, One For Each Of The 32 NFL Teams

  • Sinn Brings Back The Legendary 156 Pilot’s Chronograph With The New 156.1 And 156.1 E

  • Circula Teams Up With The Real Time Show For A Very Capable ProTrail Special Edition

  • Glashütte Original Releases Panda-Style “Silver Screen” SeaQ Diver Chronograph

  • AP Introduces the Code 11.59 Selfwinding Flying Tourbillon Chronograph Openworked

Today’s reading time: 11 minutes and 4 seconds

👂What’s new

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I’m still catching up with Geneva Watch Days releases, despite it being more than a week since the show ended. That’s how many new watches were introduced in just three days. But the watch world doesn’t revolve just around these big events, as a lot of big brands aren’t involved. So they use the overall hype of the industry with new releases and piggy back on that. This is exactly what TAG Heuer did late last week when they updated their very modern, very sporty, Extreme Sport collection, originally launched in 2016 as a cutting-edge edition of the Carrera, with a couple of chronographs and a couple of tourbillons.

Starting with the Carrera Chronograph Extreme Sport, it really is extreme and sport. It’s a huge watch that measures 44mm wide, 15.1mm thick and actually has a rather decent lug-to-lug of 49.7mm for such a large watch. That’s because TAG actually shrink this down a bit in thickness and lug-to-lug when compared to the previous version. To help make it a bit more wearable, the case is made out of titanium (either untreated or with a DLC coat) and is hollowed out on the sides to save on weight. Those recessed flanks get a sandblasted finish, as does the rest of the case. on top is a fixed black matte ceramic tachymeter bezel with grey markings. There’s also a version of the watch made out of rose gold and titanium, and that gets rose gold markings on the bezel. Water resistance is 100 meters.

Keeping with the extreme modern sporty look, the dials are heavily skeletonized and reflect one of the four colors you can get the watch in. The colors are orange, blue, black and rose gold to match the case. The colors appear on the flange, hand tips, date numerals and a couple of other details. The applied indices have a black centre but are otherwise rhodium plated and faceted. You get a chronograph minute counter at 3 o’clock, hour counter at 9 o’clock and a running seconds at 6 o’clock. That sub-dial at 6 also has an opening to show the openworked date disc which is a pretty sensational looking series of skeletonized numbers that can be seen throughout the whole dial.

All four models are powered by the in-house automatic calibre TH20-00, which is based on the Heuer 02, featuring a column wheel and vertical clutch, with an 80-hour power reserve. The watches come on integrated rubber strap that match the detail colors on the dial. The watches are available now and are priced at CHF 8,000 for the regular Carrera Chronograph Extreme Sport, CHF 8,200 for the DLC coated one and CHF 12,000 for the rose gold version. You can see more of those watches here and here.

Then, there’s the Carrera Chronograph Tourbillon Extreme Sport, which comes in a very similar 44mm wide case that is either fully made out of Grade 2 titanium with a black PVD coating or out of rose gold with a titanium container, featuring a brushed and polished rose gold tachymeter bezel with black markings. The PVD version gets a a black forged carbon tachymeter bezel with grey markings. Both versions have the same cutouts as the regular chrono version.

The skeleton dials also remain very similar the the chronograph version, with minute and hour counters at 3 and 9 o’clock, but now you get a rhodium-plated tourbillon escapement at 6 o’clock, with no date track. The colors on the dial are either all black or with rose gold details, depending on the case you get. The watch is powered by the calibre TH20-09, a self-winding column-wheel chronograph movement with a tourbillon regulator. It will get you 65 hours of run time. The watches come on black integrated rubber straps and they are priced at CHF 25,500 for the black version and CHF 32,000 for the rose gold version. See the black one here and the gold one here.

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American Football is far from being the most popular sport in the world. Some even argue that it has a tough time breaking into the top 10 most popular sports in the world if you don’t count the Super Bowl viewership. However, I recently read an article that points out that not only is the NFL the most valuable sports franchise in the world, bringing in twice the revenue of the next most successful, it’s so valuable because of their hard-core fans and the never-ending amount of merch they are offered for purchase. Well, here’s another item die-hards can get — and I do mean only die-hards, who else would drop $8k on a watch with their favourite football team on it — the Breitling Chronomat NFL Collection, made up of 32 different watches for the 32 NFL teams, each very limited. It’s a pretty wild collection.

The entire collection is based on the Chronomat B01 42 watch, which means you get a stainless steel case that measures 42mm wide and 15.1mm thick and absolutely nothing has changed on the outside. You still get the polished and brushed finishes, the polished stainless steel bezel with the four recognisable tabs and sapphire crystals on top. Out back you get a sapphire display caseback that has a full-color NFL shield logo and a commemorative “One of 104” engraving around the edge of the display window. Water resistance is still 200 meters.

What’s different, of course, are the dials. Each of the 32 variants gets a unique dial. These will include team colors as the base color of the dial with the team logo in the 9 o’clock sub-dial. While each of the 32 variants has its own dial color, they all share the same layout, a tri-compax that has partial azurage sub-dials at 3, 6 and 9 o’clock, a central chronograph hand and a silver outer chapter ring featuring both a tachymeter and decimal scale.

Inside all 32 variants is the in-house Caliber 01 automatic chronograph movement which beats at 4Hz and has a great 70 hour power reserve. It’s also COSC Certified and decently decorated with Côtes de Genève, arabesque brushing, and polished anglage. The watches can be had on either a stainless steel rouleaux bracelet, or a black rubber strap that mimics the rouleaux look.

Each of the 32 Breitling Chronomat NFL Collection variants will be made in 104 pieces, meaning a total run of 3,328 watches. Price is set at $8,800 on the rubber strap and $9,200 on the steel bracelet. See all the variants and find your favorite team on the Breitling website.

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Sinn Brings Back The Legendary 156 Pilot’s Chronograph With The New 156.1 And 156.1 E

It seems that Sinn is a company that will cater to every nerd’s dreams, no matter how specific you are. Whether you’re looking for a field watch, a pilot’s watch, a pilot’s chronograph or a pilot’s chronograph that you can take diving while in the Southern hemisphere and drinking mai-tais, Sinn tires to cover every single niche. One of the niches they fulfil are pilot’s chronographs, which they produced between the 1980s and the early 2000s. Sure, there have been pilot-like chronos since then, but none like the legendary Model 155 and 156. Well, since we’re nerds and Sinn likes nerds, they did us a solid and they are brining back the 156, the unlimited Sinn 156.1 and a limited 156.1 E which features an aviation-inspired date window with vintage-colored lume.

The new watches are very true to the original Sinn 156. But sticking to the original in most aspects will be very controversial to fans of smaller watches or owners of smaller wrists. That’s because it measures 43mm wide, 15.45mm thick and has a 51mm lug-to-lug. Perfect for my Shrek-wrists, not so sure about the majority of other people. The case is made out of stainless steel, bead blasted and gets the Tegimented treatment, meaning it’s resistant to scratches. On top is a Tegimented non-ratcheting rotating bezel that also gets a PVD anthracite coating. Sinn swapped the plexi of the original for a sapphire crystal. The watches have 100 meters of water resistance and are also resistant to low pressure, which is goof for a pilots watch.

The two watches have very similar setups when it comes to the dial, with both having a matte black dial and white printing. Key differences being their colorways and the shape of their date windows. While the standard-production Sinn 156.1 features white-colored luminous material, red-finished chronograph hands, and a traditional rectangular date window, the limited-edition Sinn 156.1 E receives beige-tinted lume, white chronograph hands, and an arch-shaped date window that is inspired by the Kollsman window of a barometric aviation altimeter.

There’s a big change on the inside. While the previous versions had the Lemania 5100-based movements, these new ones come with the Sinn SZ01 which is based on the Valjoux 7750. One of the cool changes made to it is the addition of the central minute counter. The movement beats at 4Hz and has a 42 hour power reserve. The watches come on black leather straps with either white or red stitching, with a bracelet available.

The Sinn 156.1 enters regular production at a price of €3.950, while the Sinn 156.1 E is limited to 300 pieces, with price starting at €4,290, but you get both the strap and the bracelet. See more on the Sinn bracelet.

4/

It’s About Time has always supposed to be an un-biased source of news in the watch world, with the intention of covering as many releases as humanly possible. I also believe it’s fair to the reader to disclose any bias you might have when writing a review. And despite this not being a review, I will disclose my bias. Not only have I become quite friendly with Alon Ben Joseph and Rob Nudds from my favorite watch podcast right now, The Real Time Show (TRTS), they also connected me with Cornelius from Circula watches and I did some work for him (can’t wait to show you what we came up with, it’s pretty cool). With that connection disclosed, I’ll also mention one more thing — I had the Circula ProFlight in for review the other day (it will be up soon) and it just might be one of my 5 favorite watches this year, I loved it so much.

But now we have a new watch from Circula, a collaboration with TRTS — only the second collaboration for the podcasting duo (trio?), the first being a pretty spectacular collab with Sherpa watches — in the form of Circula’s ProTrail watch. This is Circula’s field watch, but less minimalist and way more robust. The hand-sandblasted stainless-steel case had dramatic angles and facets, measuring 40mm wide, 12mm thick and with a very comfortable 46mm lug-to-lug. On top is a flat, fixed, brushed bezel with no markings and beautiful polished facets. It’s also a capable watch, antimagnetic up to 80,000 A/m and with 150 meters of water resistance. This special edition also has a special edition caseback that’s engraved with a topographic map.

The dial is where the TRTS guys gave their touch. You have a flat matte black base and they took the beautiful numerals from the ProFlight and used them of the 3, 6, 9 positions, combined with simple lumed squares for the other hours. You get the same Alpha-style, but much thicker, hands as the rest of the ProTrial series and here they are silver and filled with lume. Around the perimeter of the dial is a railroad-style minute scale. The seconds hand has an orange tip.

Inside the watch is a very familiar movement, the Sellita SW200-1 in its elaboré grade. Easily servicable, robust and reliable, the SW200 beats at 4Hz and has a 38 hour power reserve. Circula adjusts the watches to -5/+7 seconds per day. The watch comes on the same nylon sailcloth strap that the ProFlight comes on, but now in black, and it’s one of the better straps I’ve used.

The new Circula ProFlight x TRTS is an unlimited special edition, and can be yours for €1,179. See more on the Circula website.

5/

There’s not a lot of company for watches in the world of diving chronographs. Very few companies will try to overlap both a capable chronograph and a diver that can go down to 300 meters. Mostly because of the fact that the only way to deal with the pressure and have enough room to house all the chrono components means that you have to make a huge watch. So, the diving chron is necessarily a niche product. That’s why I’m super happy to see that there are brands still doing them. Brands like Glashütte Original, who just released the new SeaQ Chronograph Silver Screen in a panda colorway.

Like I said, to make a diver chronograph, it’s almost certainly going to be large. The SeaQ Chronograph measures 43.2mm wide, 16.95mm thick and has a 51.6mm lug-to-lug. Sounds huge, especially since it’s made out of thick and heavy stainless steel, but that’s not even close to being the biggest chrono diver on the market. The Omega Planet Ocean Chronograph goes up to 18.5mm in thickness, if I’m not mistaken. But SeaQ’s robusntess gives it a lot of capability, so it easily matches DIN 8306 and ISO 6425 standards for dive watches. On top is a unidirectional rotating bezel that has a black glossy ceramic insert that has a 60-minute diving scale, surrounding a highly domed sapphire crystal. Water resistance is 300 meters.

The dial is what’s new for the GO SeaQ Chronograph. It comes with a matte silver base, with sub-dials framed with black circles with snailed surfaces. The hands and markers have blackened outlines and large white SLN inserts and there’s a pretty impressive large date, also in black, above the 6 o’clock position.

Inside the watch is the in-house Calibre 37-23, an automatic integrated flyback chronograph with a column wheel and a vertical clutch. It has a silicon balance spring for magnetic resistance, beats at 4Hz and has a 70 hour power reserve. It’s also a Glashütte Original, so you know the movement is nicely decorated with stripes on the three-quarter plate, bevelled and polished edges, polished blued screws and a skeletonized rotor with solid gold mass. The watch can be had on a number of rubber or textile straps, or a steel bracelet with a micro-adjustment system.

The new SeaQ Chronograph is on sale right now and priced at €15,300 for a strap with a pin buckle (€15,600 to add a folding clasp) or €16,500 on the bracelet. See more on the Glashütte Original website.

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People will likely never stop calling Audemars Piguet the Royal Oak company. And for good reason, seeing as how that was pretty much the only watch they made for decades with only the slightest of variations to differentiate models. Then in 2019, AP attempted to change that perception by introducing the Code 11.59, a brand new model for them. To say that it had a rough start would be being very kind. But it kind of seems that AP is getting into their groove when it comes to the Code 11.59, with the collection now very diverse at a while range of prices. Now, we get a new grey Code 11.59 Flying Tourbillon Chronograph.

On the outside, it largely keeps the same case. This means that it measures 41mm wide and 13.8mm thick, with a case middle and crown made out of black ceramic, a 18k white gold bezel, hollowed lugs, all of which has a brushed and polished finish to it. On top is a double domed sapphire crystal, with the thinnest of bezels. Water resistance is enough to wash your hands, 30 meters.

The dial is largely openworked, with a slate grey rounded bezel with circular snailing and a white seconds track on the periphery of the dial. The rest of the dial is a combination of a blackened mainplate and rhodium-plated silvery grey bridges that support the two sub-dials at 3 and 9 o’clock. At 6 you’ll find the flying tourbillon. The central hour and minute hands are made out of pink gold and contrast well with the overall monochrome look. Additional touches of pink gold can be found on the sub-dials and the balance wheel. The movement and bridges feature over 100 hand-polished inner angles and alternating satin-brushed and sandblasted components.

The movement powering the watch is the calibre 2952, a column-wheel automatic chronograph movement with flyback functionality. It beats at 3Hz and has a 65 hour power reserve. It’s also beautiful to look at, with a rhodium-toned openworked pink gold rotor.

AP doesn’t say that the Code 11.59 Selfwinding Flying Tourbillon Chronograph will be limited, but it will be tough to come by. The price is on request, but surely above CHF 200,000. See more on the Audemars Piguet website.

🫳On hand

Our selection of the best reviews we stumble upon

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⚙️Watch Worthy

A look at an off beat, less known watch you might actually like

It’s important to note that the Frog300’s inspiration doesn’t stem from a singular watch. Rather, it comes from a combination of the best watches Joseph wore in the past. Finally, he took the name Frog300 from a military tradition dating back to WWII in which scuba divers are often called “frogmen.” In line with this, the Frog300 complies with MIL-STD-810H. This is a military standard of testing and examining equipment’s resistance to the environmental conditions it may face throughout its lifetime.

⏲️Wait a minute

A bunch of links that might or might not have something to do with watches. One thing’s for sure - they’re interesting

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

This trailer has me all kinds of emotional. I’ve been watching these three review cars for more than 20 years. And it wasn’t just reviewing cars. I learned a lot about what people want and how it can be done. And now it seems to be over. Tanzania sure seems like a perfect place to end it.

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