Simply Abu Dhabi XXIX

2 0 4 S I M P LY A B U DH A B I R ichard Mille only launched one new watch this year, but when you’re Richard Mille, one timepiece is enough—such is the extreme technological accomplishment and groundbreaking innovation housed in each new watch from the unique watchmaker. The RM 50-01 Pablo Mac Donough, is a new tourbillon piece that looks more conventional than the original RM 053, but has been made with some amazing materials and is powered by an incredibly beautiful and advanced movement. The original—and as the watchmaker freely admits, “absurd”—idea behind the RM 053, was to have one of the world’s greatest polo champions, Pablo Mac Donough, wear a tourbillon calibre timepiece in competition. Shock is the very last thing you want to expose a tourbillon movement to, so to place one is the intensely combative and high-impact sport of polo is simply an incongruous notion… it’s asking for trouble. But Richard Mille relishes a challenge and so the mission began. “Polo is a dangerous sport, and hard knocks are a regular occurrence. It’s a very elegant game, but also a contact sport,’ Mille explains. “Given that Pablo has sustained a large number of fractures in the course of his career, I asked our teams to come up with a watch that could resist the many types of shocks arising in a polo match, whilst leaving the movement visible.” Richard Mille RM 50-01 Pablo Mac Donough