Russian Grand Prix & Gerald Genta
Mile Marker Win In Russia & The Man Who's Made a Massive Impact On The Watch World
Russian Grand Prix
Lewis Hamilton is no stranger to the Russian Grand Prix run in Sochi. Since the race’s contract was renewed in 2014, Hamilton has won it 4 times - 2014, 2015, 2018, and 2019. When Hamilton didn’t win, his team still took the top spot, with Mercedes winning this race every year from 2014-2020 - they were the team to watch again this year.
After the drama of the first lap, the top 3 were Carlos Sainz (Ferrari), Lando Norris (McLaren), and George Russel (Williams) - with Hamilton and Verstappen in 7th and 17th, respectively. There was not much drama for a while until Lando Norris passed Sainz on the inside during the 13th lap. If you remember the Italian Grand Prix, both Hamilton and Verstappen had troubles in pit lane. These troubles were alleviated this week with quick pits moving medium tires for both guys. Lando Norris also had a quick pit in the 28th lap.
With the new tires, Hamilton easily made his way up to 2nd place, trailing Lando Norris by just half a second into the 47th lap of the 53 lap race. During the 47th lap, however, the rain came pouring down. Drivers and their teams had to make the decision to pit again and change tires or stick it out. Hamilton, during lap 49, opted to swap out his tires for rain tires. Lando responded “NO!” when his team asked him if he’d like to swap tires.
Come lap 51 it is raining so hard you can hardly see the drivers come down the track. I noted earlier Lando refused to swap out of his slicks - this ended up being the downfall of his race as he slides off the track and allows Hamilton to pass him to take control over 1st place. Verstappen, also on rain tires, moved his way through the pack up into 2nd. Sainz holding onto 3rd. This is Mercedes's 8th straight win in this race and Hamilton’s 5th.
Massive congratulations to Hamilton on his 100th career win!
Gerald Genta
Gerald Genta is arguably one of the most influential people in the watch industry over the last ~70 years. Designing his first watch at the age of 23, Genta went on to design iconic watches for Omega, AP, Patek, IWC, and Cartier to name a few.
In 1970, AP came to Genta to have him design a waterproof steel watch - and they wanted it the following day. Under time pressure Genta was one of the greats. The thought of a waterproof watch made him think of the old diving masks, featuring an octagonal shape. Thus, the AP Royal oak was born.
A few years later in 1976, Patek Phillippe asked Genta to design a watch for him. Similar to the Royal Oak, Genta kept with the nautical theme (you might already know where I’m going with this). He designed it with the thought of large ship portholes. It took him about 5 minutes to draw this watch on a napkin and it eventually turned into a grail of a watch - The Nautilus.
These being two of my top 3 favorite watches ever made, I give a ton of props to the designer Genta was. If you would like to read about any of the other watches he designed, you can visit this link.
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