Hands-On: The Breitling Navitimer B01 Chronograph 43 Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team

To mark its entry into the Formula 1 paddock via its new sponsorship deal with Aston Martin and the Aston Martin Aramco Formula 1 team, Breitling is launching a limited edition version of its iconic flagship chronograph, the Navitimer. The Breitling Navitimer B01 Chronograph 43 Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team is limited to 1959 pieces–a nod to the year Aston Martin first joined the Formula 1 series. The watch itself doesn’t stray too far from the well-established design cues that make the Navitimer the historic model that it is. But there are some tweaks and touches that make this a bit more suited to timing vehicles on the ground rather than in the air. 

Let’s face it, the Navitimer is an aviation watch, at least in its original purpose. Sure, it’s a chronograph and utterly useful for timing things, including lap times, but its novel slide-rule functionality on the bezel (which I’ve yet to take the time to figure out how to operate, sadly), among other functions, has always made this timepiece a true aviation instrument. Not inspired by the air, but built for it as a gauge and tool for pilots. First produced in 1952, Breitling introduced the Navitimer (a portmanteau of “Navigation” and “Timer”) in collaboration with the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA). Those early and now highly desirable references were even co-signed with the AOPA winged logo. 

The Aston Martin Navitimer downplays its flight-instrument attributes to highlight its abilities both trackside and behind the wheel. It’s surprisingly light in the hand and on the wrist thanks to the use of a titanium case. While it keeps the Navi’s traditional proportions with a 43 millimeter diameter, its lack of heft and very reasonable lug-to-lug of 49 millimeters makes this somewhat big watch a potential wear for those of us, like me, with a wrist size less than 7 inches. 

As for what ramps up the Aston Martin of it all, that’s (mostly) relegated to the caseback, with some more subtle features on thedial side. Under the cambered sapphire glass is a black carbon dial flecked with Aston Martin racing green. For good measure, the chronograph counter seconds hand is hard to miss, with a neon-greenish/yellow tinge that matches the F1 team’s accent colors. The same neon shade is used for the stitching of the embossed leather strap. This certainly isn’t the traditional strap one thinks of when conjuring a classic Navitimer in the mind’s eye. 

At first glance, the always busy Navitimer dial seems fairly subdued, but a closer look reveals plenty of textures and colors that contrast with the classic white subdials and the white applied indexes with an Arabic numeral at 12 o’clock. In addition to the date at 6 o’clock, the watch features all the classic Navitimer counters surrounding the bezel, allowing one to still calculate things like airspeed, time of climb and descent, fuel consumption, time en route, and unit conversions using the circular slide rule bezel.  The hands, save for the zippy chrono seconds hand, are simple and unobtrusive, with flat white (and lume-filled) hour and minute hands, and black hands on the 60-second, 30-minute, and 12-hour totalizer subdials. 

Save for its lightweight titanium material, the case is classic Navitimer, compact and sharply carved at the 22 millimeter-spaced lugs. The simple pushers offer great action, as to be expected with the column-wheel, vertical clutch, B01 chronograph movement inside, that’s the heart of the model line, and COSC certified to boot. 

Punctuated by a half-onion crown, the case thickness is a not-so-svelte 13.7 millimeters, but it still feels compact enough to wear well on my wrist thanks to the case shape and titanium material. The Navitimer B01 Chronograph 43 Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team is priced at an even CHF 9,000 in Switzerland. That’s a mere CHF 250 more than the classic stainless steel cased model in the same size. 

It’s on the caseback that things get more Aston Martin. The strap underside color recalls the team livery, and the oscillating weight, visible through the sapphire open caseback, features the Aston Martin and Formula One Team logo. The caseback is engraved ‘one of 1959’ and posits that these are ‘Instruments For Drivers’ just in case you might have thought this was a pilot’s watch. As with other Navitimers, this one offers a useful, if not particularly ambitious, 30 meters of water resistance. 

Echoing the decision it made last year to keep the logo off the dial of the limited-edition retro-cool Top Time B01 Martini Racing, we applaud the lack of Aston Martin branding on the dial here. It feels like the days of car names and logos on watch dials are behind us, and we’d like to keep them in the rear-view mirror for as long as possible. And while the Navitimer doesn’t instinctively feel like a racecar watch, it certainly has the same chronograph functionality (and then some with its circular slide rule bezel) as a Rolex or TAG chrono, if not the history on the racetrack. 

Breitling’s marketing and heritage departments are no doubt hard at work finding the right stories to help guide us to more links and history of the brand’s ties to motorsport. Let’s see how this Formula 1 foray plays out for the unabashedly generalist marque that’s previously demonstrated it almost always has the right watch for the task for just about any customer – as long as it finds the right story to go with it. 

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