I remember quite clearly when I first saw the Indy Autavia, a decade ago in the TAG Heuer museum at LCDF, and thinking how cool it looked. When we were producing the Autavia 1962-85 book we were lucky enough to be sent the watch by Marie Ansel (in charge of their heritage dept at the time) to inspect closely and photograph. What makes this watch so special is that it's the only silver dial in the 1960s screw back case, and that the ‘wings and wheel’ logo is sublime. It's printed with metallic gold paint, sparkles in the sun and even has something of a 3D appearance due to the texture of the print appearing to rise above the dial surface. Rewind back to 2010 and we only knew of a couple, whereas today I have noted twelve, and whilst we used to think they might have been sold in the gift shop at the circuit, it is now thought they were produced to be gifted by Tony Hulman, who owned the motor speedway at the time.

For those not of a motorsport persuasion, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway hosts the Indy 500, which is considered one of the ‘triple crown’ of motorsports along with the Monaco GP and the Le Mans 24hr. This is a race that has been won by American legends such as Foyt, Mears and Unser, as well as Grand Prix champions: Mario Andretti won the Indy 500 and Graham Hill is the only driver to have completed winning the ‘triple crown’, both wearers of Heuer Autavias themselves. Indeed Mario Andretti is something of a Heuer living legend, having the standard 3646 Autavia named after him for the several he owned and wore!

All of this makes the watch very desirable, and it has attained top Heuer grail status, along with the likes of the Autavia 2446 & 3646 with all lume hands, and the unicorn that is the 2446 1st exec Seafarer. It also holds the Heuer auction record for a non film/celebrity memorabilia sale when it realised $199,500 in the June 2017 Christies’ New York sale. Although Heuer valuations fell after that auction there has been a rebound for the rarest Heuers during the Covid period and we find ourselves back in a similar place today. There have only been a couple traded since, and the Christies sale was an outlier, so today a valuation would realistically be £85k+ for the very best. However, in recent years the very best and rarest Autavias have remained in the hands of collectors and have been conspicuously absent from auction halls. So we wait for another top example to fall under the auction hammer to find out exactly how high it might go again...

If you would like to learn more about the Heuer holy grails, check out the link below to read about the Heuer Superstars book, which showcases the best of the best holy grails from Autavia, Carrera, Monaco, Seafarer and Skippers. Alternatively the Autavia, Carrera and Monaco have their own dedicated and detailed collector reference books.