Steve McQueen wore the Heuer Monaco watches as he filmed Le Mans, making them perhaps the perfect embodiment of the racing watch. Now, one is to be sold at auction and is expected to realise as much as $1 million.
Steve McQueen starred in Le Mans in 1971. He convinced as driver Michael Delaney in part because of his own personal obsession with speed.
McQueen owned as many as 100 cars at a time, raced to a good level, and often performed his own stunts in some of the most famous chase scenes in cinema history – notably in The Great Escape and Bullit.
TAG Heuer, the 1860-founded Swiss watchmaker, supplied six watches for the film. Of these, four had the leather straps that McQueen is seen wearing on screen.
TAG own two of them, buying them back, for $800,000 in 2012 and $88,000 in 2009.
McQueen gifted one to his mechanic. Haig Alltounian sold it for $2.2 million in 2020. A record for a TAG Heuer.
This example also ended up with a mechanic from the film, Bevan Weston. He subsequently worked in Indy car racing, selling his watch privately in 2010.
Now, it can be yours.
Will it challenge the record?
Whether it does will be an interesting measure of the watch market in 2024.
The most valuable watches in the world have shared the peculiar heritage of this watch: a Hollywood star with a genuine personal obsession with racing cars and a great watch maker.
Paul Newman’s Daytona watches are now a brand in their own right. One of Newman’s personal examples sold for $17.8 million earlier this year.
McQueen and Heuer don’t have this cachet, but perhaps they should, and perhaps this sale will raise them towards this level.
“For enthusiasts of McQueen, racing, or vintage chronographs, this watch represents the ultimate addition to any collection – a true ‘end game,'” said Geoff Hess, Sotheby’s Global Head of Watches.
The watch model is a Monaca (ref 1133B) with an automatic chronograph caliber 11.
It will sell at Sotheby’s in New York in December.
