From record-breaking deep-sea dives to lunar landings, OMEGA’s legacy is replete with large-scale accomplishments. The first of this year’s big achievements is in fact rather tiny – its new Spirate System, but it is expected to have a huge impact on the marque as OMEGA plans to introduce this innovation into many other calibres over time
Speedmaster Super Racing
OMEGA’s latest Speedmaster – the Speedmaster Super Racing in stainless steel – is fine-tuned for precision thanks to the Spirate System, which includes a revolutionary new patent-pending spiral that allows for ultra-fine rate adjustments. Thanks to this one-of-a-kind mechanism, it is now possible for OMEGA to achieve certified precision of only 0/+2 seconds a day. To meet these narrow targets, OMEGA had to quite literally reinvent the wheel: drawing on both the technical resources of the Swatch Group and the precision, stability, and reliability of OMEGA’s chronometrically superior in-house movements. The innovative solution was a totally new Si14 balance spring that allows the watchmaker to act on the stiffness of the hairspring’s attachment point through an eccentric adjustment mechanism located on the balance bridge.
The new Speedmaster is a visual tribute to OMEGA’s 2013 anti-magnetic masterpiece, which offers a clear view of the new mechanism through the sapphire crystal caseback. Circling the dial is the distinctive racing style minute-track and a black ceramic bezel ring with the famous tachymeter scale in new yellow “grand feu” enamel. This bold yellow shade, featured on the Seamaster Aqua Terra >15,000 GAUSS of 2013, is also used on the gradient chronograph hand and striped small seconds hand at 9 o’clock. The watch’s 60 minute/12 hour recorder, directly opposite at 3 o’clock, also serves as a second time zone. The honeycomb pattern of the dial references a concept timepiece on display at OMEGA Museum which survived extreme magnetic fields of 160,000 GAUSS.
Providing the power is OMEGA’s state-of-the-art Co-Axial Master Chronometer 9920, a perfect amalgamation of the many milestones on the road to Spirate and certified at the industry’s highest level by the Swiss Federal Institute of Metrology (METAS), which in this case includes confirmation of the 0/+2 seconds a day precision made possible at large scale by the industrialisation of the Spirate System. The diamond-polished and bevelled black arrowhead indexes are filled with a new and exclusive Super-LumiNova that emits a surprising yellow glow. This colour code extends to the Speedmaster and Super Racing wording on the dial.
At 6 o’clock there’s a stylish and regular reminder of the >15,000 GAUSS 10 year-anniversary: a “10” in Speedmaster logo font, which appears once a month in the watch’s date window. The new Speedmaster Super Racing includes a sporty alternative to the steel bracelet – a NATO strap in recycled nylon with black and yellow stripes, referencing the distinctive colour code of the Seamaster Aqua Terra >15,000 GAUSS launched exactly 10 years ago. The timepiece is offered in a honeycomb pattern Speedmaster watch box in black with yellow stitching that includes the recycled nylon NATO strap and a strap changing tool.
