John Player Specials are hardly remembered as a brand of cigarettes anymore. Odd, because they were what my mum smoked, so were the first brand I chuffed as I pinched them from her in my teenage years.
In motor racing circles, the colour combination of black and gold is synonymous with the Lotus Formula 1 team, which won seven constructors’ World Championship titles and six drivers’ World Championship titles in the 1970s with the likes of Jim Clark, Graham Hill, Jochen Rindt, Emerson Fittipaldi and Mario Andretti at the wheel.
Watch collectors have given the JPS tag to black and gold pieces, most notably the Rolex Daytona.
Now De Bethune is using the same colours for a version of its DB28GS in steel, titanium and zirconium.
There is an interesting engineering similarity between the watch and Formula 1 cars that inspire it.
In racing cars, aerodynamics are perfected that push them into the track to increase grip. De Bethune has taken this effect but turned it upside down with balances that pass so close to the mainplate that they tend to experience a suction effect. To counteract the issue, watchmakers have given De Bethune’s balances an airplane wing shape that provides lift and lightness that almost allows them to fly.
De Bethune explains that, while the suction effect is even more powerful with the acceleration of the car, the same occurs during the acceleration phase of the balance.
Just as the F1 car takes advantage of the upturned wing to press the car to the ground when it accelerates, the benefit is just as effective in reverse for the balance, which uses the airplane wing process to avoid it being ‘pushed’ towards the mainplate.
Visually, the 44mm watch is a mix of gunmetal grey titanium, black DLC and gold.
