VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera Glassbox Tourbillon by Black Tag Watches

 

FEATURE: My Top Ten Aquaracers by Albert AMG

Hello Aquaracer fans, today we have another 'Top 10 Aquaracers' post for you, but unfortunately this month's guest Albert-AMG hasn't provided any text with his selections so to prevent this post being just a bunch of pictures I will step in and provide my own thoughts on his choices. 

ON THE FACE: TAG Heuer 'Flex' and 'Pro-Shield' Sunglasses

TAG Heuer Boutique / Stratford, London 21st March 2024

It must be said that the reaction to TAG Heuer revisiting their sunglasses range has not been entirely positive in the watch community... it seems that TAG making shades again somehow means that they will not be taken seriously as a watch company - don't ask me how that works because I don't understand it. No Rolex don't make shades, but they don't need to. I don't see the connection. Are Mont Blanc not taken seriously as a pen maker because they make watches... and fragrances? 

To be honest  I'm more surprised that companies like TAG Heuer haven't started making fragrances yet, since they have plenty of contacts in the LVMH group they could tap and fragrances are even more profitable than watches. Besides, I already own a pair of TAG Heuer shades and I like them a lot, so I was keen to see what the company would come out with.

VIDEO: TAG Heuer 1000 Series 'Lume Dial' Quartz Watch by Birth Year Watches

 

FEATURE: Red Bull Racing Factory Visit

 

Now look, I know what you're thinking.... lucky old Rob got to go to the Red Bull factory as a guest of TAG Heuer or Red Bull or some other generous benefactor... isn't life just cushty as a super-famous and important watch influencer? Well, no... haha,  you couldn't be more wrong. Because in actual fact I got to go to the Red Bull factory today because my amazing wife bought me/us (the outrageously expensive) tickets for Valentine's Day. 

Yes indeed, my wife is awesome!

And so on the morning of the 18th of March we headed off to Milton Keynes for a few hours of bumbling around the MK centre. Annoyingly the Goldsmiths was shut for refurbishment, but at least the TAG Heuer boutique was open and they had both the watches we were interested in seeing in stock - namely the green dial Dato and the new 'Polar Blue' Solargraph. I will write about these separately (because I desperately need content and Watches & Wonders is still so, so far away), but the TL:DR is that the Solargraph was disappointing while the Dato wasn't actually as bad as I expected it to be. Go figure...

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Link Chronometer by Birth Year Watches

HISTORY: TAG Heuer Carrera Part Four (2019-2021)

 

Due to serious health issues, the legendary Jean Claude Biver stepped down as CEO of TAG Heuer making way for Stephane Bianchi, although he in turn would make way for Frederic Arnault less than two years later. Frederic would stay in the position for four years, eventually being promoted to CEO of LVMH Watches. 

2019-2020 CATALOGUE & DEALER CATALOGUE

2019 saw the introduction of the Heuer 02 movement in a big way, including a limited edition 'Nanograph' which featured a silicon hairspring.

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera Pink/Green 36mm by Perth Watch Girl

 

FEATURE: Maybe Don't Try This at Home...

Long term readers will know that over the last few years I have bought and sold a huge number of 'classic' Formula 1s, indeed at one point I had fifteen of them and was homing in on 'completion'. But then I realised that I didn't actually want twenty 30 year old watches sitting on my shelf lining up to expire on me and so I decided to sell a few. And then a few more. And then once I started selling them I just couldn't stop until I had only one left - the very first one I got. 

I guess I could have saved myself a lot of hassle and just kept that one in the first place, but as usual I got carried away, over-stimulated by all the bright colours... until I realised that the only one that didn't look silly on my 7.1/2" wrist was the all black one with red highlights. Isn't that just typical?

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Dato' Calibre TH20-02 by Chisolm Hunter

 

FEATURE: EBAY: No Fakes. No Fraud. No Doubt?

With adverts like the one above eBay is doing its best to convince us that their site is a super-safe place to buy watches. Of course, when it comes down to it only watches above the value of £1500 are actually sent for verification/certification - but to the casual observer who's not paying too much attention to the finer details eBay is depicted as a safe marketplace, which is... convenient. While I applaud eBay taking some kind of action, we've already seen people receiving watches with warranty cards that don't match their watches so I guess the question is do we trust the super-duper eBay authentication service? And if we're supposed to trust them to spot the super fakes of 2024 then presumably it should have no trouble spotting a really bad fake on their site, right? 

Apparently not. 

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Peach Dial' Calibre 7 Automatic by Brent Miller Time

FEATURE: C.O.C.O. Meet Up London 2023

Way back in 2022 our Swedish friend Jim Dollares announced that he planned to visit London and wanted to arrange a THF forum meet-up. Despite a tiny ripple of enthusiasm in the forum this ultimately came to nothing and ultimately we decided on Jim and I meeting in London with Charlie (Imagwai) joining us in the evening for dinner. But once the date was set it transpired that this wouldn't be possible due to child care commitments and the intervention of British Rail... instead Charlie said we were welcome to visit him in his opulent Kent abode in the evening, so that's what we did.

Yes I already mentioned British Rail, and British Rail were quite a big part of this story one way or another. Put simply, there was a rail strike, which meant if we were gonna make this work then we needed to take the trains as much out of the equation as possible. So, I decided the smart thing to do would be to drive to Charlie's, get the train to London and back, and then drive home (Jim was staying overnight with Charlie before heading back to the airport). This eventually turned into ‘drive to Orpington’ since the limited train service available served that station better than Charlie's local station, albeit the last train back was still a ridiculously early 6:05pm!

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera 'Year of the Dragon' Limited Edition Chronograph by The Watch Village

 

HISTORY: TAG Heuer Titanium (1984-1988)

The 'Titanium' was a very short lived and very '1980s' watch (both literally and figuratively). It first appeared in the 1984 Heuer catalogue and had its last appearance in the 1987/88 TAG Heuer catalogue. As such it is another one of those odd watches that can be had with either a 'Heuer' or 'TAG Heuer' branded dial and there's a good chance that even if you get a TAG Heuer dial the backplate and clasp might well still be stamped with the old 'Heuer' logo... that's just how it was in the 1980s kids!

I find some of the 'Titanium' designs appealing, but others markedly less so. I actually remember looking longingly at a 220.206 on eBay for quite some time, to the point where I went to the trouble of enquiring if TAG Heuer had any spare links should I need to extend the bracelet. Unfortunately the response I got was that they wouldn't sell links for watches of that age and it would have to be returned to them to be 'worked on'. As you might imagine, hearing that I thought better of it and turned my attention to something else. A shame really as the 220.206 is a cool looking watch and would have been a nice addition to my collection... but no way was I putting myself in that position. 

Okay, well clearly this isn't going to be another super-long 'History of' post because there are only eight models in total (and only eleven variants of those). Needless to say I'm still working on the rest of the Carrera posts and they will be along in good time. 

VIDEO:TAG Heuer Carrera 'Skipper' Calibre TH20-00 Chronograph by WatchBox Reviews

 

SPOTLIGHT ON: TAG Heuer Formula 1 'OneLife Rally' Limited Edition Quartz Chronograph

CAZ101AM.FT8054*

Occasionally TAG Heuer will make 'special order' models for special clients, generally organizations or charities; these tend to be standard models that have been modded with a logo either on the dial or the backplate. This one popped up on the TAG Heuer forum (I think it was spotted on Instagram) and it's basically a stock CAZ101AM that has been customized with a 'OneLife Rally' engraving on the side of the case and on the backplate.  

VIDEO: TAG Heuer Carrera Reverse Panda Glassbox TH20-00 by Gullie

 

FEATURE: My Top Ten Aquaracers by Shane Paradis

 

As you know, this year we are celebrating 20 years of the magnificent Aquaracer and today I'm pleased to welcome the newest addition to our 'Council of Considered Opinion' - Shane Paradis. Shane is an American with a refreshingly positive attitude to quartz and older TAG Heuer models in general, which leads to some interesting and dare I say it 'unexpected' choices in his personal list of  'Top 10 Aquaracers'. He's also the first person not to include any of my Aquaracers in his Top 10, but I won't hold that against him. Honestly!

VIDEO: The Outstanding Revival of the TAG Heuer Carrera BY ID Guy