How Tag Heuer Reimagined A Racing Icon

To mark its 160th anniversary, TAG Heuer has released important new versions of its storied Carrera chronograph. We spoke to Jack Heuer, the man who designed the original almost six decades ago, about how this watch went the distance

- Charlie Burton

UNLIKE MANY DESIGN CLASSICS, TAG HEUER’S CARRERA DIDN’ T START WITH A MOOD BOARD OR A SKETCH. Instead, in the beginning, was the word. ‘I found the name in 1962 before I even thought of the design,’ says the watch’s creator, Jack Heuer, now 87 years old and the company’s honorary chairman. Specifically, he found the name in Sebring, Florida, the location of the famous 12 Hours motorsport endurance race. His company was supplying pocket chronographs for the timing of the event. One day, in the Ferrari pits, he found himself talking to the parents of the drivers Pedro and Ricardo Rodriguez. They admitted how relieved they were that their boys were too young to have competed in a race that’d recently been cancelled because it was deemed the most dangerous in the world; the Carrera Panamericana. Heuer loved the sound of its name. He registered “Heuer Carrera” immediately.