TEED UP: Tag Heuer is doubling down on its long-standing connection with the golfing world with a collaboration with equipment specialist TaylorMade.
The star is a special edition of its Connected Calibre E5 45mm smart watch. Alongside it are a Spider ZT putter inspired by the design of the watch and co-branded accessories such as a watch roll, glove caddy and duffel.
Tag Heuer took its first swing in 2005, when the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton-owned watchmaker created its first dedicated golf watch. Since then it has moved from timing the game to trying to understand it, particularly with the Connected Watch line, bringing what chief marketing officer George Ciz called “a natural progression to explore” the timepiece and how it can work with golf.
The Connected Golf edition went on to become “literally one of our best sellers in the connected watch field,” he added, crediting the experience as “one of the best possible that you can have on the golf course, on your wrist.”
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From there the question for the watchmaker became how to push the concept further. Two years ago, there was a hookup with trendy golf brand Malbon.
For Ciz, a fresh answer was to work with TaylorMade, a brand that already occupies the top of the game and is “revolutionary in many different ways, just like we are in the watchmaking” world.
John Gonsalves, vice president of global digital and direct-to-consumer at TaylorMade, said the golfing specialist, best known for ushering in the era of fairway metal or “metal wood” clubs, was flattered to work with a partner that they have been watching in the golf space for some time.
“Bar none, the experience of the Tag Heuer watch for the golf user is the best experience out there,” he added. “From a brand perspective, the way that we approach our market and our consumer and our products is very much the same.”
On the wrist, the Tag Heuer Connected Calibre E5 45mm x TaylorMade Edition, retailing for $2,550, is built on the latest Calibre E5 platform with a 45mm grade 2 titanium case, black ceramic bezel engraved with 18 holes, a touch screen and a full suite of sports and wellness sensors.
More importantly, the piece automatically records every stroke and position, then hands that data to TaylorMade’s performance engine for strokes-gained analysis.
“The watch seamlessly records every stroke you make, every score you make on every hole, and at the end of the round it then sends all of that to an immense database that TaylorMade has, and it analyzes back and sends back a report card,” Ciz explained.
That breakdown spans four key areas of the game — driver, approach, short game and putting — and, as Gonsalves said, “it simply measures the quality of every shot that you hit against every other player who would have played that shot.”
And don’t worry about tech getting in the way of enjoying the sport; the detail arrives only once the round is complete. “You get the kind of AI-driven type of description that helps you interpret your score on the app on your phone. It’s super cool,” Ciz said.
