Watch Edit: Tudor’s latest Black Bay, Pelagos FXD GMT and Black Bay Ceramic – now worn by Formula One’s Visa Cash App RB team – continue to broaden the brand’s appeal

Dec 2 , 2024

Today, Tudor’s Black Bay comes in colourways such as burgundy or black. Photo: Handout

Metas-certified Black Bays add to the brand’s technical chops while the latest Pelagos maintains the proud lineage of models worn by the French Navy

In October, Tudor added a GMT/Zulu Time complication to their titanium fixed-lug Pelagos FXD collection for the first time. This resulted in the Pelagos FXD GMT, a watch that taps into the brand’s long-standing partnership with the Marine Nationale – the French navy – creating a piece specifically for the Aéronautique Navale, the French navy’s air arm.

The Tudor Pelagos FXD GMT. Photo: Handout

The Pelagos FXD GMT is ruggedly durable, at 42mm diameter and almost 13mm thick in Grade 2 titanium with a Grade 5 caseback. At the heart of the Metas-certified piece beats the 4Hz MT5652-U movement, which boasts 65 hours of power reserve and a travel GMT complication with 24 hour bezel. The matt black dial contrasts with the beige hour markers with blue lume and the green Super-LumiNova hour markers on the bezel. As is traditional with Tudor’s military partnership, the caseback is engraved with MN 2024 (Marine Nationale 2024).

Tudor’s Pelagos FXD GMT boasts a military background. Photo: Handout

The orange Zulu time hand is the main attraction: Zulu Time is the aviators’ term for Coordinated Universal Time, the standard baseline for handling time zones. Between the orange hand, bezel and standard time indications, the wearer can track up to three zones around the world.

Getting their sea legs

Tudor’s Pelagos FXD GMT is rugged and durable. Photo: Handout

This is just the latest in a long line of outstanding pieces that underpin Tudor’s seagoing partnerships. In 1956, the Groupe d’Etude et de Recherches Sous-Marines (GERS, a scientific body attached to the navy) tested the then-novel Oyster Prince Submariners – References 7922 and 7923 – in real-life situations. The self-winding and manual pieces respectively both had 100 metres of waterproofing which the GERS commanding officer deemed “perfect”, and their performance “entirely correct”.

The Tudor Pelagos FXD GMT has been developed with the Aéronautique Navale (the French navy’s air arm) in mind. Photo: Handout

The Marine Nationale placed subsequent orders, to the point that Tudor became the official supplier by 1961, with one particularly famous reference being the 9401, which was launched in the 1970s and issued to servicemen into the 1980s. To set the year of issue apart, the initials MN and the year were engraved on each caseback.

Tudor revived its relationship with the Marine Nationale in 2021, unveiling the fixed lug variant Pelagos FXD. In that model, fixed strap bars replace traditional removable spring bars, which secure a single-piece polyester woven ribbon strap with a Grade 2 titanium pin buckle.