The Richard Mille RM029 Le Mans Edition limited to only 150 pieces!
There is something pleasingly bonkers about releasing a hyper-modern and highly technical watch to celebrate an event that showcases vintage race cars, but, this is exactly what Richard Mille did back in 2023 to celebrate the centennial of the Le Mans Classic - an endurance race held biannually at the famous Circuit De La Sarth in, you guessed it, Le Mans, France.
The “Classic” offers a twist to the modern 24 hours of Le Mans - only vintage cars that raced Le Mans between 1920 and 2000 can enter the Classic - think of it more as a heritage event mixed with the pure joy, sounds and smells of old metal, wailing turbos, hot oil, and exhausts pelting round an endurance track and you’re pretty much there.
It is a nostalgic dream of a race.
Add in a 40mm Richard Mille executed in striped British Racing Green and white Quartz TPT with an orange crown and dial accents to pair with the Le Mans Classic colours - and you have the RM029.
Is it vintage? No. Classic? No. But does it work? Remarkably - yes!
Beyond being an ever-popular RM, the colourway is the key to success here as it’s fresh, unconventional, and attractive with a retro vibe even to those who dont particularly follow the automotive side of things, and for those who do - its a 150 piece limited edition celebrating 100 years of the race - so its a win-win as far as I’m concerned.
It’s also great for daily wear - The case is manufactured using quartz TPT (Thin Ply Tecnnology) which is an incredibly tough composite material made using multiple wafer thin layers of silica (quartz) fibres that are injected with coloured resins to create a strong, heat resistant material that is exceptionally difficult to dent or dink.
Lightweight and durable is the name of the game here - and a niche that Mille excels at.
The skeletonised dial is no slouch either and follows the same colourway as the case.
It features a grand date at 4, a Le Mans Classic Logo in the shape of the tracks Dunlop bridge at 7, and at 2 - la piece de resistance - a 24 hour subdial which plays homage to the great race itself and has two distinct elements.
The outer ring is a fixed 24 hour scale.
The inner disk rotates, with its printed blue arrow pointing to actual 24 hour time on the external ring, so it is a true 24 hour indicator.
The printing on the inner disk is a nod to Le Mans, particularly its 4pm start time as that is how the disk is oriented, so while it looks a little “squint” it is actually calibrated to reflect the 4pm start time as a nod to the race, that way, as well as seeing actual 24 hour time, you can also amuse and entertain yourself by mentally mapping where you would be relative to the start time if you were participating in Le Mans.
Essentially a partly useful tool and partly high end alternative to Newtons Cradle for those bored in the office moments.
The RM029 is powered by calibre RMAS7 which features a 55 hour power reserve and a variable geometry rotor - a nifty little feature that allows winding efficiency to be adjusted to the wearers activity level.
All in, this is a fresh and good-looking limited run RM, that works as a standalone piece as well as a collectors item for die-hard Le Mans fans.