Panerai 44.00 mm Watches Sale, Discount Panerai 44.00 mm Replicas

Panerai Luminor Marina Automatic Titanium (PAM00279)

absolutley beautiful Panerai watch! I bought the watch in black and white and both are gorgeous. A famous 5th Avenue designer that starts with the letter F has buckle watches out right now and these are right on par. Thanks!

---- [Rating: 5 / 5 stars]

Review by Arianne j, From Italy Valle Lomellina Pv

Panerai Radiomir Chrono Pink Gold (PAM00377)

Stunning and beautiful. Definitely an eye catcher piece. Recieve complements on it often. Great watch!

---- [Rating: 5 / 5 stars]

Review by Sascha M Walenta, From USA Leonardo

Panerai Ferrari Scuderia Rattrapante Black / Red (FER0033)

I have ordered twice from UpReplica. The prices are GREAT and the delivery is SUPER FAST. I will be ordering again from you real soon!

---- [Rating: 5 / 5 stars]

Review by Diana E, From United States Glencoe

Officine Panerai presents the Radiomir 1940 10 Days GMT Automatic in two new exclusive Special Editions. The Radiomir 1940 design is for the first time combined with the P.2003/10 manufacture movement, the automatic calibre with date, GMT function and a power reserve of a full ten days, which is presented for the first time in a skeletonised version.

The 45 mm Radiomir 1940 case is made of 5NPT red gold and is water-resistant to 50m. The dial - available in brown or black - has an elegant satine soleil finish and the famous sandwich structure invented by Panerai to provide the maximum visibility and legibility of its indications even in very low lighting conditions.

Designed, made and decorated in the Panerai Manufacture at Neuchâtel, the P.2003/10 movement is the first skeletonised automatic movement from Officine Panerai. Measuring 31 mm, it has three spring barrels, 25 jewels and a balance which makes 28,800 vibrations per hour (4 Hz). Its functions are hours, minutes, small seconds, date and linear indication of the remaining power reserve at 6 o'clock, as well as a second time zone displayed by an arrow hand, with the relative AM/PM indication on the counter at 9 o'clock.

The mechanism can stop the balance and zeroes the seconds hand as soon as the winding crown is pulled out; it also enables the local time hand to be adjusted forward and backward in jumps of one hour at a time, without stopping the minute hand or interfering with the running of the watch, but automatically adjusting the date.

The artistic aspect consists of the delicately worked skeletonising, which reveals the complexity and sophistication of the movement. The rotor of the oscillating weight is grooved and embellished with the engraving inscription "Officine Panerai" on the outer edge. Beneath the rotor, which rotates in both directions, the skeletonised bridges and barrels can be seen, which reveal the technical structure of the various components and their chamfered and polished edges.

For the first time in Radiomir 1940 collection, the dial of the new Radiomir 1940 3 Days Automatic is offered in white. Its graphic design maximises the dial's clarity and legibility, with the large black figures corresponding to the hour markers and the small seconds dial at nine o'clock, a characteristic of Panerai watches of the 1940s.

The cushion case, in AISI 316L stainless steel with polished finish, is 42 mm in diameter and only 10.93 mm thick. Its shape and proportions are those of vintage Panerai examples but the standard of its materials, finish and ergonomics have been updated and perfected to meet the highest standards of contemporary high quality sports watchmaking.

On the back of the watch is a round window with a sapphire crystal through which the in-house automatic P.4000 movement can be admired. The structure of the calibre is particularly rugged and reliable, with a wide brushed-finish plate covering the greater part of the mechanism, and the full balance bridge with twin supports which carries the balance, oscillating at a frequency of 28,800 vibrations per hour. The off-centred oscillating weight is set within the movement and thus making it possible for the calibre to be only 3.95 mm thick. Made of tungsten, the rotor oscillates in both directions and it is connected to the two spring barrels in series which store a power reserve of up to three days, the new minimum standard for the power reserve of Panerai watches fitted with Manufacture movements.

The new Radiomir 1940 3 Days Automatic (PAM00655) is water-resistant to 100 meters and it is supplied with a natural, untreated leather strap, with contrasting stitching.

When it comes to gold watches, not all golds are the same. Beyond the simple differences in yellow, red and white gold, brands are increasingly differentiating their collections with their own personalized alloys of the precious metal.

For many, a Swiss Made gold watch is the ultimate status symbol, regardless of the complexity of the movement that beats inside it. But the sheer range of different types of gold offered by luxury watch brands, each clamouring to ensure us that their version of gold is better than anyone else's, can be confusing.

How gold is your gold?
It's interesting to note that the ISO 8654 standard that governs the colours of gold is actually derived from a Swiss watchmaking industry standard that was first drawn up in 1966. This standard classifies gold colours in six grades, from 0N to 5N, the latter of which you may well have seen in numerous gold watch specifications. But what do these numbers mean?

They refer to the observed colour of the finished product, rather than any specific alloy of gold. The 0N and 1N colours contain only 58.5% gold and are therefore not 18-carat (or 18K or 18 Karat if you are American) alloys. Any alloy containing 75% gold or above is considered 18-carat, which is the case for 2N to 5N gold. At the top of the scale, 5N gold contains the least amount of silver if it is used in the alloy and therefore offers the reddest hue to the finished product, which is referred to as red, pink or rose gold, depending on the watch brand.

The World Gold Council, however, uses a much more specific notation, subdivided into three colours of 18-carat gold as follows:

• Yellow gold: 75% gold, 15% silver, 10% copper
• White gold: 75% gold, 25% platinum or palladium
• Rose gold: 75% gold, 9.2% silver, 22.2% copper

As we can see from the current offerings from the leading watch brands, not all rose gold alloys - the predominant one at least as far as men's gold watches are concerned - are the same, as the brands carefully juggle the three main constituents of the alloy to create their own "house blends".

Magic Gold - Hublot
Hublot's unique and proprietary Magic Gold alloy is produced in the brand's own mini-foundry on site at the manufacture in Nyon. The secret recipe combining gold, copper and platinum creates the world's first and only scratch-proof 18-carat gold alloy.

Sedna Gold - Harry Winston
First used by Omega, this gold alloy that is exclusive to the Swatch Group brands contains a higher proportion of palladium, which gives the case a warmer colour and finish. Harry Winston uses it for the first time this year in its Avenue collection. The palladium ensures a long-lasting lustre to the red tones in the case. The alloy is named after the trans-Neptunian object that astronomers called Sedna and is renowned for its red glow.

King Gold - Hublot
King Gold is the other gold alloy used by Hublot. Its exclusive colour is even redder than traditional 5N red gold. To achieve this result, the brand's metallurgists increased the percentage of copper and added platinum in order to stabilise the colour over the years and neutralise oxidation.

5Npt gold - Panerai
Surprisingly, Panerai only introduced its first models in red gold at the SIHH in 2012. The 5Npt alloy used by the Florentine brand consists of almost one-quarter (24.1%) copper, which adds a redder tinge to the gold Panerai watches. Like Hublot, Panerai adds a tiny percentage of platinum (0.4%) to prevent oxidation of the metal.

Chopard - Fairmined gold
Chopard cares more about the provenance of its gold than it does about its colour. The brand has gone to great lengths to incorporate Fairmined gold into its collection, since it requires an entirely separate foundry and production line and it must ensure that the Fairmined gold is not contaminated with any other type of gold - even in the waste recovered during the manufacturing process. The Fairmined appellation means that the gold was mined in a responsible manner and that the miners themselves receive fair payment and an overall premium for demonstrating that gold can be mined sustainably.
Chopard was the first brand to launch a high-end luxury watch made of Fairmined gold: the L.U.C Tourbillon QF Fairmined, which was presented at Baselworld last year.

Ten yachts and their crews will leave Lanzarote in the Canary Islands today in a race across the Atlantic Ocean to Martinique in the Caribbean. But the yachts are not high-tech, futuristic multihulls (one is nearly 90 years old) and their skippers are far from being superstars of sailing.

As its name suggests, the Panerai Transat Classique is more concerned with reminiscing about the golden age of sailing, pitting the wits of the skippers against the elements and the weather. In keeping with the spirit of the race, some skippers choose to navigate only by sextant.

Gildas Rostain, skipper of , the winner of the inaugural 2008 edition of the race, sums up the atmosphere on this unique regatta: "The days pass too quickly, so you owe it to yourself to remain positive every minute you are aboard, even in the most difficult moments. Make the most of the special moments. Have a drink, sit back and enjoy the sunsets in the trade wind zones, the shine of the varnished wood, that obedient spinnaker... Don't miss a second of it!" 

What's more, for the third edition of this transatlantic race, the organisers have made the course even more difficult. Right at the start, the skippers have to take a gamble: head south to pick up as soon as possible the powerful trade winds that will carry them across the Atlantic, navigate through the Canary Islands archipelago to save on distance (it's the shortest route) but risk getting caught in the calm of the lee of the islands, or seek out the ber, but often more fickle, winds to the north. You can follow their progress in real time, and see whose gamble paid off, on the official website of the Panerai Transat Classique.

You don't know why, because it is totally subjective, irrational and sometimes cumbersome. It's called passion, that mixture of feelings without reason that are impulsive and uncontrollable. There is Passion with a capital "P", which harbours Love and Friendship. But there also the smaller passions that make us so human and tell people a lot about us through our exacerbated interest for a watch, an automobile, a butterfly or a sport!

The fact that you are reading this article probably means that you are already slowly giving into such passion, or that you are already completely overcome by it. Because these small objects that beat away on our wrists often provoke such emotions. It is an immoderate taste for beautiful mechanics, for what they convey and how they affect us, eventually making us insincere about anything else. 

So I warn you that the rest of this article is governed by this sentiment, which is summarised perfectly by the maxim of Chamfort (the poet, not the singer…) : "All passions are exaggerated and they are only passions because they exaggerate."

"Rock bottom" 

I discovered Officine Panerai in 1998 on a walk down the rue du Rhône in Geneva. 

There were numerous beautiful timepieces in the windows of Les Ambassadeurs, and among so much finesse, gold, painted and painstakingly finished dials, there were three gargantuan watches, with dials as sad as a day without bread that were trying to make some room for themselves alongside a model of some kind of a submarine. 

These grandfather clocks for the wrist were not fit for the top level of the window display, where the beautiful Swiss products were decked out in their finery to catch the eye of the passing connoisseur. No, they were on the second level, near the floor. 

In other words, at rock bottom… 

So I carried on, but intrigue got the better of me and I returned to enter the store and try to find out more about these watches. Surrounded by customers trying on presitigious timepieces, I was almost embarrassed to show any interest in this piece with its bizarre growth, on a gold leather strap. So, in order to hide my uneasiness, I first asked about the most visible models, eventually mumbling "and 'that', what is it?"

The reply was instant, "it's a Panerai"… 

"A what?"… 

A long discussion followed, along with one of the biggest regrets of my life. I left the shop without it… Paneristi will understand. 

"Daylight" 

But the seed of passion had already been planted. Each time I passed the window, I looked at these ugly ducklings of the watchmaking industry, oversized and, in some cases, black, hoping one day to make my move. 

And then, sometime later, I finally gave in and bought a simple model, with two hands and the logo of the brand. At the time, wearing a watch with a 44mm case was at best considered bad taste and at worst as vulgar. So I only took out my "precious" at the weekend. 

On one of my weekend walks, someone approached me. I noticed he had his eyes fixed on my wrist. "Is it a Panerai?" he asked me, proudly showing me his own wrist. His had a white dial with the strange inscription "Daylight". He said, "It's the same one that Stallone wears in the film." I replied with an "ahh" and, to avoid appearing too ignorant, I replied "I don't think I've seen it". 

The conversation carried on for over an hour. Panerai, Stallone, Daylight, etc. It was the first time I had met one of these kindly, crazy types that we now know as "Paneristi"

It wasn't long before I went to buy the video of Daylight. The PAM wasn't white, it was black. Never mind, I wasn't alone. The story could continue.

Paneristi for… quite a while

Since then, the Florentine brand has come a long way. And I have followed it for most of that time. 

I visited THE store in Florence a few years later, then started to learn more about the brand. Why? Honestly, it's difficult to say why, but above and beyond the watches, Panerai helped me to discover a whole world of aficionados. 

"Pre-V", "non matching", "8 Giorni", "Destro"… none of these terms hold any secrets for me any more. They are the foundations of the "risti" vocabulary. And the Officine only needs to announce a new "Marina Militare" for the whole community to go wild. 

And the brand has quite clearly grasped this. 

Officine Panerai is one of the rare brands to have such an active community of fans spread around the world who are as critical as they are admiring. They have their rites, their customs, their heros and their meeting places. 

They help to perpetuate the legend so much that the Officine has even dedicated several special editions exclusively to them, of which the last one (the) proudly bears on its back the inscription "Paneristi Forever", a little over the top, perhaps, but a great reminder of the links between the brand and its fans. 

For the latter a watch has to be simple, functional and without fuss. 

"The men at the end of the watches"

I've said it and wrote it countless times, I don't like tourbillons or inaccessible complications that put watches further out of reach of genuine aficionados. The strength of Panerai lies in having allowed many everyday guys to become true connoisseurs. 

And even if we are all unfaithful to the brand today (sorry!), we always end up coming back to her in the end. Or to convince ourselves that our passion is still intact. 

I know that some people will not understand this obsession. For them, the is too simple or not sophisticated enough. Some people are even dismissive of its Florentine origins, when the company was merely a local assembly workshop. 

But that doesn't matter. The Paneristi are a hardened bunch. And they have a good time. Because above all they like the fact that their common passion leads them to discover the "men at the end of the watches", to quote my friend Sylvain Couthier, the Big Boss of the French ristis. 

We are waiting to welcome you to the fold… 

The new Radiomir Composite® Marina Militare 8 Giorni - 47 mm introduces itself by showing the two most authentic sides of Officine Panerai: state-ofthe- art technological innovation and a deep-rooted history.
The material used for the case is truly innovative in the field of fine watch-making: the Panerai composite is a material whose features and performance are exceptional, being practically immutable over time. The result of an electrochemical process of ceramization of the aluminium, this material is harder than the ceramics normally used for cases in watch-making (zirconia), and also harder than metals like steel and titanium, as well as being lighter. Thanks to its qualities of ductility and reliability, the Panerai composite allows for complex and extremely precise workings and is the result of processes that, up to now, were employed in the creation of components for the aeronautic industry and for car and motorcycle races requiring the highest levels of performance.

From the aesthetic viewpoint, the Radiomir Composite® Marina Militare 8 Giorni - 47 mm has a mono-colour look: the matt, deep brown of the 47mm Radiomir case and of the crown are in tune with the brown of the dial and strap in vintage leather. The stitching of the strap is a reminder of the ecru colour of the Super-LumiNova® on the hands and the other elements of the 'sandwich' dial: indexes and numerals, small-seconds dial at 9 o'clock, the words Marina Militare and Panerai and the second dial with the inscription 8 giorni brevettato, deriving directly from the historic models.
The movement of the new Radiomir Composite® Marina Militare 8 Giorni - 47 mm is the P.2002/7 Calibre, entirely developed and built by Officine Panerai. Hand wound and with a 13 ¾ lignes diameter, the movement is made up of 191 components and has three barrels ensuring a long power reserve of around 8 days, a traditional feature of Panerai watches since the 1940s.

Officine Panerai is still holding their position as one of the most popular watch brands in a stressed market. When the watch brand introduced their 44 millimetre Luminors in 1997, the watch market had not yet embraced oversized watches. But Panerai changed all that.

Even though other watch brands claim to be a "man's watch", only few other actually were meant for the hairy male wrist, Panerai being one of these with their smallest size being 40 millimetre.

New Radiomir, new size
44, 45 and 47 millimetre seems to be the standard size of a Panerai, however the Florentine watch company will introduce a stunning 42-millimetre Radiomir in pink gold with a wonderful brown dial. The layout of the dial is still the classic one and represents another of the characteristic features of Panerai watches. The exceptional legibility in the dark is in fact achieved through a 'sandwich' structure with the luminescent material placed between two metal layers, the top one perforated in correspondence with the numerals and indexes.

Also luminescent and plated in pink gold, to complement the case, are the index-shaped hands and perpetually moving small seconds hand in the auxiliary dial at 9 o'clock. The watch, with wire lugs that are easy to remove when substituting the strap and water-proof up to a depth of 100 metres, features the classic screw-down, truncated-cone crown ensuring maximum water-tightness.

New movement honoring the past
On top of that, Panerai will equip the new Radiomir with their latest inhouse movement, P'999. With a diameter of 12 lignes and a thickness of only 3.4 millimetres, the new hand-wound P.999 movement features 19 jewels, a 60-hour power reserve and a balance wheel oscillating at 21,600 alternations/hour.

Panerais very first watches were also equipped with manual movements. When the first prototype was produced in 1936, also Radiomir, it was equipped with a Rolex modified Cortebert movement. Later versions were equipped with an Angelus 8 Days movement. This new Radiomir, PAM336, is movement-wise a historic salute to the early days of the Florentine watch company. And a modern salute to the manufacteur position that Panerai proudly holds today.

In 2009, for the fifth consecutive year, some of the most prestigious yachting locations on the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean will be hosting the international regatta circuit for vintage and classic sailing boats, sponsored by Officine Panerai. A now historic event, as well as an opportunity to see the most beautiful classic boats still seafaring, assembled together and in action, in locations that have marked the history of sailing.
The Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge 2009 takes place from April to September, and this year includes three regattas in the Mediterranean (Antibes and Cannes on the French Riviera and Porto Rotondo in Sardinia) as well as four regattas overseas (Antigua in the Caribbean, Nantucket and Newport's double event on the Eastern US Coast).
Considering both the Mediterranean and the American stages, 2009 will see the participation of around 350 vintage yachts, amounting to a total of over 1500 crew members, taking part in at least 15 regattas.
The overall winners of each individual stage in the two categories, Vintage (boats built before 1950) and Classic (boats from between 1950 and 1975), will be awarded a watch specially created by Officine Panerai as an exclusive limited edition: for 2009 this watch is the new Luminor 1950 Regatta Rattrapante 44mm, DLC, split-seconds chronograph conceived as a highly specialised instrument for the needs of yachtsmen. In both of the abovementioned categories, the best placed crews from among the winners of the individual Mediterranean stages will win the Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge Trophy, which will be awarded on the occasion of the Regates Royales in Cannes, the final race in the circuit.

The Mediterranean regattas, under the aegis of the CIM (Comitato Internazionale del Mediterraneo), will be organized in collaboration with the major national classic yachting associations including AIVE (Associazione Italiana Vele d'Epoca) founded in 1982 in Italy and AFYT (Association Française des Yachts de Tradition), established in 1994 in France. For all yachting enthusiasts, there is a little known aspect related to these regattas. Anyone with basic sailing experience will have the opportunity to go on board and feel all the excitement of sailing on a vintage boat. All they need do is introduce themselves to the boat owners at the quayside on the day prior to the regatta and ask permission to go on board. Indeed many of the crews are informal and made up of families and some boat owners are always on the lookout for people offering their help in rigging at sea. A noticeboard is always set up on the quayside to enable those offering a place on board to get in touch with those volunteering their help.
In 2009 Officine Panerai, the fine watch-making company founded in Florence in 1860, celebrates its first five years as sponsor of this prestigious yachting circuit, a partnership which will certainly continue in the future, due to the profound values they share, the linkage with the sea, beauty, history and age-old skills.
Officine Panerai's passion and commitment to safeguarding and spreading the culture of vintage yachting also lie at the heart of the purchase of Eilean, the 22 metre Bermudian ketch built by legendary Scottish boatyard Fife in 1936, the same year as the first Panerai watch.
Rediscovered almost abandoned in Antigua in 2007, thanks to the efforts of Officine Panerai, Eilean was recovered and as of the past two years can be found at the Cantiere Navale Francesco Del Carlo boatyard in Viareggio. The restoration work has almost been completed using original materials from the era which will allow the vessel, from next year, to plough through the waves of seas around the world and race in regattas in forthcoming editions of the Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge.
 

Calendar

The 2009 fleet

Aurica schooners, Bermudian ketches, yawls, sloops, cutters - these are some of the sailing boat classes the Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge offers the opportunity to admire and learn about. Over 90 percent of these boats were built of wood using traditional planking techniques and almost all of them have in the past twenty years undergone major or minor restoration work, without which they would not have been able to continue sailing.
In the Mediterranean, the greatest concentration of vintage yachts can be found between Italian regions Tuscany and Liguria and the French Côte d'Azur. The most part of those vessels, known as the "ladies of the sea", were created from the pen of masters of world boat design such as Scotsman Fife of Fairlie, the Americans Olin Stephens (who died in 2008 at 100 years of age), Camper & Nicholson and Nathaniel G. Herreshoff, or Englishman Laurent Giles. Among classic yachts distinction surely goes to those built by the Sangermani boatyard of Lavagna, in Liguria, an undiminished legend in Italian boatbuilding. Today all these boats represent living testimony to over a century of yachting history.

A selection the of partecipants

The historic 23 metre Stormvogel from 1961, the floating set of the movie "Dead Calm" starring a young Nicole Kidman, following its appearance in the Classic Yacht Regatta in Antigua, will leave for the Mediterranean where it will take part in all the stages of the Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge 2009. Stormvogel will be attempting to repeat its 2008 victory in the 'Classic Yacht' category. Also competing in Antigua will be the 53 metre steel vessel Eleonora, a spectacular reconstruction created in Holland in 2000 of the American schooner Westward from 1910.
Amongst the giants expected at the Mediterranean regattas, in addition to the 46 metre Lulworth from 1920, is Zaca, usually based in Monte Carlo. This majestic aurica schooner of 43 metres this year marks its 80th year since its launch in California in 1929. Zaca, which has a past as an oceanographic survey vessel, was for years the floating residence of Hollywood legend Errol Flynn and hosted Orson Welles and Rita Hayworth for the making of the movie "The Lady from Shanghai". The same birthday will be celebrated by La Spina, a 12 metre International Tonnage vessel in its second season on the classic yacht regatta circuit.
A unique opportunity is offered by Moonbeam IV from 1914, the spectacular 33 metre aurica cutter which was used by Prince Ranier of Monaco and Grace Kelly for their honeymoon. The yacht is at the disposal of anyone wishing to hire it 'by day' on the occasion of the regattas. Around twenty people can be received on board to experience the excitement of regatta racing together with the crews.
Also the wooden Navy vessels are making ready to take part in the new edition of the Panerai circuit. All of them have in fact renewed their Tonnage Certificates for the current year. The yawls Stella Polare (1965), Corsaro II (1961) and Capricia (1963) will line up alongside the Bermudian cutters Sagittario (1972) and Chaplin (1974).
The parade of honour will go to those boats which in 2009 celebrate their centenary. In addition to the 18 metre Varuna there is Tuiga, the 22 metre vessel owned by Prince Albert of Monaco, launched at Scottish boatyard Fife in 1909. Equipped as an aurica cutter it belongs to the 15 Metre International Tonnage class. Its direct competitor in regattas is near twin The Lady Anne, another Fife product from 1912.
The Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge is not without so-called 'eighteen hundreds', yachts built two centuries ago. Amongst the leading title-winners is 13 metre Bona Fide from 1899 and the 33 metre aurica ketch Black Swan, launched in the same year.
A new entry is Peter, a 15 metre yawl from 1939, while a yacht well known on the circuit is the California 32 Amorita from 1937, which won second place in the 'Vintage' category in 2008. Once again this year Amorita could clash with its "rival twin" Cholita, the California 32 which won the 2005 edition of the circuit.
Also appearing in the Panerai Classic Yachts Challenge is the 15 metre Delfino, the 19 metre Samurai, Bufeo Blanco, Emeraude, Galvana, Manta, Swala, Vistona, Susanna II and Patience, and cutter Marconi from 1931, returning to the seas in 2007 after a compete restoration at the Francesco Del Carlo boatyard in Viareggio.
Among the other yachts taking part in the circuit is the aurica ketch Tirrenia II from 1914, and Kipawa, the fast Norwegian racer from 1937. Also Rowdy from 1916 will be attempting to win again the Panerai Trophy in the 'Vintage' category, as it did last year.
One of the minor yachts taking part is Astarte II, an 11 metre vessel from 1970. Designed by Trieste-born Carlo Sciarrelli, the most important Italian designer of classic boats who died in 2006, it will have a new wooden mast replacing the previous aluminium one. The queen of the small vintage boats however will be Halcyon from 1920, a half-cabin vessel rigged as an aurica sloop with a length of 7.62 metres, belonging to the Wianno Senior class created in the USA in 1914, requiring little maintenance and transportable on a trailer. It was on an identical yacht that American president John Fitzgerald Kennedy learned to sail.

Luminor 1950 Regatta Rattrapante 44 mm, DLC

Created in a limited edition of 500, the Luminor 1950 Regatta Rattrapante 44 mm, DLC is a split-seconds chronograph, accompanied by a chronometer certificate which indicates the final 5 minutes preceding the starting signal of a regatta. This is a specialized model which, not just in name but also in its technical content, was conceived as a genuine instrument for the yachtsman.

Compared to the 2008 edition, the new Regatta features different and unusual workmanship on the case which gives the watch a black colour through the innovative coating known as DLC. This acronym stands for Diamond-Like-Carbon and indicates that the metal has undergone a process that makes it even more hard and resistant, especially to corrosion. This is a fundamental property for yachtsmen who are constantly in contact with seawater. In addition, DLC coating makes the metal much less exposed to scratching and streaking, much more common with other metal treatment techniques.
The case, measuring 44mm in diameter, is the same as the classic Luminor 1950 and the DLC coating is extended also to the three push buttons, the crown and the protecting lever. This latter feature is the element which most bly identifies Luminor watches and it has the dual function of protecting the crown and guaranteeing its water resistance. Water proof to 100 metres (10 bars), the watch also features a screw down back, also blackcoated, with the event logo engraved, the year of the edition and the numbers identifying the model and series.
The dial, covered by 2mm thick anti-reflective sapphire crystal, has a black background with a Clou de Paris decoration of dense checkerwork giving it overall depth and highlighting the two Arab numerals and the stud indexes, luminescent like the hour and minute hands. The first of the two chronograph hands is blue-coloured with only a luminous dot at the tip. The tachymetric scale is impressed on the raised edge of the dial, while the 5 minutes preceding the starting signal are also highlighted in blue on the small dial of the minute counter.
The movement of the Luminor 1950 Regatta Rattrapante 44 mm, DLC is an automatic calibre - the OP XVIII - 13¼ lignes in diameter, with double columns wheel, features which represent the distinguishing element of high quality. Rattrapante is a type of chronograph that permits the timing of two events starting in the same instant and this is achieved with a second hand, which can be stopped and then realigned with the first while the latter continues running. The third push button, at 8 o'clock, stops and realigns the second hand. With its polished and decorated surfaces and levers, the movement of the Regatta also has the official chronometer certificate issued by C.O.S.C.