FINNS WHO FLY
For Valtteri, born 100km northeast of Helsinki, it was a no-brainer collaborating with one of watches’ smallest, but no less maverick, independent brands. S.U.F wears its Finnish heart on its sleeve, from the use of domestically forged, super-tough stainless steel, to 100% of R&D, engineering and assembly happening under Stepan’s own workshop roof, near Helsinki’s shipyards.
VB77 follows in the footsteps of S.U.F’s original tribute to another ‘Flying Finn’ – motorcycling’s Jarno ‘Paroni’ Saarinen – and it has been designed closely with Valtteri. It has unique details that cannot be found in any other S.U.F model, such as its super-tough DLC-coated case, and its open-worked dial’s racy four-way colourscheme. There’s a new screwdown crown, too, keeping things at tight as Valtteri’s cornering skills. And in keeping with Valtteri’s wry sense of humour, you’ll find the 7th day of every month displayed as ’77’.
Ticking beneath the bonnet – its ‘perlage’ finish gleaming between the dial’s racing stripes – you’ll find Soprod’s precision, Swiss-made ‘A10’ mechanics. On arrival at S.U.F, every movement is stripped down, thoroughly fine-tuned and re-oiled to Stepan’s stringent standards. This could just be the start of an amazing ride for S.U.F: on-board with a future F1 champion.
Gentlemen, wind your engines!
Technical specs
- Swiss Soprod A10 Calibre, 11.5 lines, 28800 vph (4 Hz)
- Mechanical Automatic winding
- Hours, Minutes, Seconds and date (Skeleton Stainless Steel Date wheel with “77”)
- 25 jewels
- 42 Hours power reserve
- Rhodium plated, Perlage & Côtes de Genève Finishing
- Every movement has been thoroughly checked, correctly oiled and regulated at our workshop in Helsinki
- Outokumpu Stainless Steel from Finland (SUPRA 316L/4435) DLC case body
- Matt finished Screwdown Crown
- Case size: 44 mm
- Case thickness: 9.2 mm
- Lug to lug length: 53.4 mm
- Water-resistant to 10 ATM
- 1.6 mm thick sapphire crystal with multi anti reflective coating inside ( AR coat )
- Closed caseback
- Red, Black, Blue and White Skeleton “Flying Finn" racing dial (Multilayer)
- Design by Valtteri Bottas/ Sarpaneva Watches
- Large “ Racing “ numerals in white & black print (4)
- Painted Superluminova indexes (6)
- TwoTone finished Galvanic Blued “Sarpaneva" hands with Superluminova
- Blue leather (Calf) Racing strap
- 18mm Sarpaneva DLC coated stainless steel pin buckle
- Lug width: 22 mm
Valtteri Bottas began his career racing karts at the age of six. Over the next decade he amassed countless race wins, many championships and a seven-year stint in Finland’s National Karting squad.
After winning three prestigious kart titles in 2006, Valtteri moved into single-seaters. He won both the 2008 Formula Renault Eurocup and the 2008 Formula Renault Northern European Cup, winning 17 races from 28 starts.
In 2011 he won the GP3 Series at the first attempt, claiming a win at each of the last four race weekends to secure the title in the penultimate race. He was assigned test driver for Williams in 2010 and ’11, before becoming reserve driver in 2012 – duly promoted to a race seat and competing in his debut FIA Formula One World Championship season with the Williams F1 Team in 2013.
Born on the grid again for 2022, after a career-propelling stint as Lewis Hamilton’s no.2 at Mercedes-AMG Petronas between 2017 and 2021, Valtteri is hungrier than ever: ready to fight for thousands of a second.
DIMENSIONS
- Case size: 44 mm
- Lug to lug: 53,4 mm
- Case thickness: 9,2 mm
- Lug width: 22 mm
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