Life, watchmaking, and motorsport are all about being in the right place at the right time. And in a stroke of serendipity so felicitous that it could have planned, TAG Heuer chose to release news of their chronograph inspired by the Porsche 963 on the very day that the car qualified on pole for arguably the most famous race in the world: the Le Mans 24 Hours.
TAG Heuer Carrera Chronograph x Porsche 963. Credit - TAG Heuer
Beaufort Racing Badalassi Carlo Minerva Box Leather Perforated Watch Strap - Olive Green
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Like a movie script, French star Kevin Estre put his red and white Porsche on pole position by going fastest in the very closing minutes of the Le Mans qualifying session, beating star names such as Ferrari and Cadillac. The Porsche 963 is an extremely accomplished racing car, but Estre is also considerably helped by being a complete headcase, in the nicest possible way.
I know this for a fact as he drove me round all 20 kilometres of the Nürburgring Nordschleife in Germany – the most epic race track on the planet – a few years ago in a road-going Porsche, and it was a memory that will remain lodged in my cortex forever. Especially, when at around 175 miles an hour or so, barrelling into one of the many blind corners there, he expressed the opinion that:
“There’s no such thing as fear. Just more excitement.”
Le Mans Champ Kevin Estre. Credit - Mediaworld
Well, Kevin has certainly been feeling very excited at Le Mans recently. As have we been at home, with the launch of the latest chapter in the partnership between Porsche and TAG Heuer. Porsche is the most successful manufacturer at Le Mans, so it’s understandable that TAG Heuer would time their big reveal for the beginning of the 24 Hours weekend – but even they couldn’t have predicted that it would get off to such a successful start.
Porsche and TAG Heuer (or just Heuer, as it was back then) have actually been linked since the late 1950s. Jack Heuer named his first and most famous racing watch – the ‘Carrera’ – after the epic Carrera Panamericana road race in Mexico, which was also the inspiration for a famous Porsche nameplate: still seen on the 911 now. Then of course Steve McQueen, as Porsche’s fictional racing driver Michael Delaney, wore a Monaco in the 1971 movie Le Mans (pulling off cinematic exploits similar to those of Kevin Estre in real life more than 50 years later).
Yet the partnership between Porsche and TAG Heuer wasn’t officially cemented until 2021. Since then, it has led to all sorts of collaborations, ranging from special editions that celebrated the 50th birthday of the Porsche 911 Carrera, to Connected smart watches that hint at the electric future of Porsche with the battery-powered Taycan road car as well as the company’s involvement in the all-electric Formula E World Championship.
TAG Heuer Carrera Chronograph x Porsche 963. Credit - TAG Heuer
Thankfully this latest Carrera Chronograph x Porsche 963 is very much a traditional Carrera, albeit featuring a bold skeletonised design, which echoes the tubular chassis construction of the modern generation of Le Mans cars – including the Porsche 963.
The Porsche 963 is powered by 4.6-litre V8 twin-turbo hybrid engine, which gives it similar performance to a Formula 1 car. The Carrera Chronograph by contrast uses TAG Heuer’s latest TH20-00 movement (also seen in the Monaco, as well as other ‘glassbox’ Carreras). It even comes complete with a personalised red steering wheel oscillating weight for this edition, underlining its automotive heritage. The case back additionally features a bespoke engraving.
However, it's the other more obvious Le Mans-inspired details on the face that make this watch so captivating. Le Mans races on through the night, so the blocks of Super Luminova on the chronograph subdials are laid out in exactly the same pattern as the 963’s lights. The whole aesthetic of the watch, with its light and airy skeletonised construction alongside a heavily lumed interior, echoes the day to night ethos of the Le Mans 24 Hours perfectly, with a luminescent Porsche logo on the bezel as well (and ‘Porsche’ also stamped in bold on the side of the case, just in case you hadn’t got the idea by now).
TAG Heuer Carrera Chronograph x Porsche 963. Credit - TAG Heuer
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Look on the dial, and you’ll find the index for 4pm marked out in red: the start and finish time for the round-the-clock classic. Even the shape of the strap, with a ‘v’ pattern above and below the lugs, echoes the form of the air ducts on the Porsche 963 and its predecessors. You’ll also find a Porsche 963 logo on the rubber strap, while the only colours seen on this somewhat monochrome watch are white, red, and black: Porsche’s traditional racing colours.
Wrapped in a somewhat hefty 44mm case, this watch is hardly subtle despite the muted PVD tones. But legibility and a desire to conspicuously honour Porsche’s racing legacy was at the very heart of the design philosophy, so this watch succeeds in viscerally conveying the advanced technical complexity of the Porsche 963 at the most celebrated endurance race in the world.
Naturally, it's limited to only 963 pieces and it's on sale right now for 9000 CHF. That’s a lot of money, but interestingly TAG Heuer has also extended its warranty from two years to five: an endorsement of their confidence in its prestige and engineering. Whether or not Porsche will benefit from the same confidence to add to their total of 19 wins at Le Mans so far (more than any other manufacturer) is something that we only get to find out at 4pm on Sunday…
