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Come onRafa!
Yesterday, the undisputed king of clay beat Novak Djokovic in straight sets to claim his 13th French Open title and 20th Grand Slam men’s singles title overall.
That puts him at the level of Roger Federer, with Djokovic in third place at 17, having destroyed a prime opportunity to go to 18 with his antics at the US Open last month.
The Spaniard said he had to play at the peak of his powers to dismantle the Serb so ruthlessly, and his display has rightly dominated the headlines.
Something that has gone a bit under the radar is Nadal’s choice of wristband during the tournament, which is a bit out of reach for the average consumer.
The Richard Mille watch he has been wearing retails for $ 1.05 million (around R17.3 million), although it was definitely a freebie.
Next via Forbes:
Richard Mille launched the RM 27-04 watch last month to mark the 10th anniversary of his association with great tennis. The watch weighs a mere 30 grams (or an ounce), including the strap, and is listed as the lightest tourbillon in the world. Nadal says his Richard Mille watch is like a “second skin” to him.
The Swiss watch brand says that the RM 27-04 construction was inspired by the same principles “as the strings of a tennis racket.” It is a limited edition of only 50 watches.
Nadal often wears expensive Richard Mille watches during big tournaments, and he wore a $ 750,000 watch during the 2017 title-winning run at the French Open, and a $ 725,000 watch when he won the US Open at the last year.
It must be nice to make a cool $ 40 million a year, and then get fancy watches and even yachts on top of all that.
Going back to the clock and tennis racket design principle that we briefly mentioned earlier, via GQ:
The inner workings were secured in the same way that a tennis racket would be strung, with a special steel cable woven to form a mesh structure to which skeletonized hand movement was secured.
These strings limit excessive friction and sustained impact during the course of a tennis match, while creating a striking visual feature. And did we mention there are 19 jewels and a 38-hour power reserve?
You hadn’t. Thank you for clearing that up.
Overall, it’s not a bad number to have wrapped around your wrist when you tie Federer and take home a € 1.6 million (around R31 million) payday at the same time.
You can find all the specifications of the watch on the official site here, but let’s finish with this video showing some of the internals:
[sources:forbes&gq]
