You asked for it – you got it. Here is everything you ever wanted to know about the Rolex Daytona Le Mans, ref. 126529LN, from me, an owner. You know, as I write this, I am trying to remember the last time I personally reviewed a watch on the site that I actually owned. It’s been a while – so this is kinda fun for me. And maybe it’ll become a thing – A Week On (An Owner’s) Wrist? Anyway – let’s talk Le Mans.
The other day, someone on our team asked me when the last time I was genuinely excited about a new watch was (excluding any Hodinkee limited editions, for which my excitement truly never wanes). In recent memory, there are a few that made me really happy: the AP 15202 BC, the 5270P, the Lange 1815 Rattrapante, and the Cartier Normale are a few that stick out. They are each absolutely killer watches that speak to me in every way: the aesthetic, the genetic, and the technical.
But there are two watches of recent history that made me think unholy thoughts. You know the type – if you’re afflicted with the watch disease like I am. They make you say to yourself, “I would do anything for this watch. Anything.” One of them is a small, precious metal time-only watch that looks like this. The other? Well, it’s the Rolex Daytona Le Mans ref. 126529LN.
They say that important happenings in the world leave marks on you that you don’t forget. Well, I remember exactly where I was the moment the news of this watch broke. I was here, shooting clays with some friends on a beautiful early summer Saturday. I can identify the date, too, because this watch wasn’t shown at Watches & Wonders 2023 like all the other new Rolex releases. No, it was dropped quietly (or not) at the 100th running of Le Mans.
And that’s what this watch is really about: Le Mans – a century of the world’s most important endurance race. And there’s actually some fun math to be had here. Last year, 2023, was the 100th anniversary, and 1963 – the year the reference 6239 pictured above was released – was the 40th anniversary. Perhaps that’s why Rolex first conceived of what we now know as the Daytona, as the Le Mans (as seen in my original advertisement above). However, Le Mans is more historic as a race, one might argue, and Rolex has been a part of it for generations. So it would make sense that this chronograph, indeed a Daytona, but also a Le Mans, would be shown at its 100th running.
So what is the watch, really? It’s basically a latest generation Daytona (easily identifiable by the metallic bezel ring first seen here at Watches and Wonders 2023), but with what some would call an “exotic” dial, or, in layman’s terms, a “Paul Newman” dial. Beyond that, you have an open caseback like the 2023 platinum watch, and I think, most importantly, an entirely different caliber (4132), which features a chronograph with a 24-hour counter instead of 12. It is a simple change but a meaningful one, and again, proof that Rolex isn’t resting on its laurels… ever. There are so many things to discuss on this watch – and that’s why you have a 20-minute video up top of me rambling about it. But let’s quickly run down some important points. First, there’s the open caseback, which makes the watch feel a bit thicker than my other Daytonas. But notice I said feel, and that’s because when I actually measured how thick the watch is, it’s not any thicker. So the whole “sapphire back = thicker profile” is a bit misguided, and my feeling is just that: a feeling, not fact.
The other thing to note about the caseback and the gold rotor is that this caliber really looks very, very nice. Does it compare to a hand-wound Patek or Lange chronograph caliber in terms of finishing? Certainly not, but that’s not the goal, nor are they priced the same. I think there is an assumption that Rolex calibers look industrial because that is how they are made, but as I told you almost 10 years ago when I went inside Rolex, you would be shocked at how much handwork is done on these movements. And the 4132 looks really good, as you can see here. You have deep Geneva stripes on the base plate, and the yellow-gold rotor is also finely finished.
And about that movement – the 4132 is a new caliber number, and indeed, it does do something different than the 4131 caliber found in every other Daytona –counting 24 hours instead of 12. Rolex says it needed seven additional components to accomplish this – which is to say, not a lot, but the deviation is significant for a few reasons. New Rolex calibers don’t happen often, and they also didn’t need to do this. Sure, it only took seven components to make that hour counter jump from 12 to 24 hours, but that should be commended – because Rolex is about efficiency, and it speaks to the quality and ingenuity of a Rolex caliber to be able to create what I believe to be one of, if not the only mechanical chronograph to count an elapsed full day (however I’d kindly encourage anyone to check us on this fact).
A 24-hour counter doesn’t seem like a big deal, and perhaps many will say no one else has made it because a 12-hour counter plus the human brain makes for a decent 24-hour counter – but the simple truth is that the same could be said for just about anything in high watchmaking. And Rolex did it, and they did it with a real purpose behind it – with an authentic connection to a 24-hour race in Le Mans. It’s also easy to write off the 24-hour counter as a diminutive contribution to watchmaking, but when you really consider how difficult it is to make chronographs, your mind might change a bit. As an example, look at the Patek Philippe catalog, and you won’t find a chronograph with any hour registers. The 5172 and 5270 – arguably among the finest chronographs in the world, top out at 30 minutes. Patek’s more utilitarian caliber in the 5905 tops out at 60 minutes of elapsed time. The Datograph? 30 minutes as well. You get the point.
Also, I am reminded of the Baselworld 2018, when many said the rainbow bezel was a trivial contribution to gem-setting in watchmaking (well, not Cara, she said the opposite), and look at the world now. As such, mark my words; we will see a few more 24-hour chronographs in the years to come. But like these other Rainbows, none will compare to the original in this Daytona. Another other thing to note here is that this dial is not the rich, almost glossy black you’ll see on a steel Daytona, but it’s almost metallic grey. There is a sheen to it I did not expect to see at all. It doesn’t make it better or worse, but it’s a detail you only see with the watch on your wrist – not often in photographs of it on the Internet. And as for the dial itself, we are really talking Paul Newman style here, with small square markers at the end of each totalizer’s hash marks in a way that I don’t think any of us saw coming.
Now, it’s important to know where the “Paul Newman” style dial lives in the lore of Rolex collectors because it’s something that gets thrown around a lot. First, as anyone will tell you, these special dials are fraught with challenges, but there is something undeniably cool about them. So much so that even today, years after watch collecting has entered the mainstream, they demand such a significant premium over a normal, non-exotic-dial Daytona. This can be hard to understand, particularly because we have no way of knowing which watches were born with which dial. But in the world of Rolex, so much of the value lives within the dial that it almost doesn’t matter. The most expensive Daytonas in the world, almost without fail, are those with this style of dial in them, and I wasn’t even referring to that $18 million Paul Newman Daytona. So it only makes sense that when Rolex finally brings out a contemporary Cosmograph with this style dial, the world would pay particular note. Of course, this watch is 18k white gold – not steel – in hopes of, perhaps, elevating the price point out of the realm of possibility so as to not exacerbate the already challenging supply issues (relative to the remarkable demand that Rolex watches