Welcome to SwissWatchExpo. We're here doing Fresh from the Showcase today,
the holiday Christmas edition, and I'm here to display the Shelby Cobra edition
from Baume Mercier. The Clifton Club is the second in the series of watches from Baume Mercier that
are displaying for a Shelby Cobra. Now, Caroll Shelby was a famous American race car driver
in the 1950s. He raced for Ford Motor Company. And one of the things that made him famous was
he decided that it was time to move against Ferrari in Italy because Ferrari was dominating
some of the race car series events throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. So Ford had a huge
rivalry with Ferrari and decided that they were going to employ Caroll Shelby to come up with a
race car design that would defeat the Ferrari race car. Well, that was the original Cobra Roadster,
which if a lot of you may remember what that car looks like, it looks like a little convertible.
It's exactly what the Mazda Miata was actually designed after which a lot of
people don't realize later in the series back in the late 1980s to early 1990s.
Caroll Shelby just recently passed away leaving his legacy to his automobiles and his lifelong
dedication to Ford Motor Company. One of the interesting things about the 1960s was in 1964,
when this particular vehicle debuted, the Ford Mustang also debuted in American motor culture.
So there's a lot of things that were happening in the early 1960s through the mid 1960s. One of the
contributors to Ford Motor Company's success was also Lee Iacocca. Now he doesn't have an exact
connection point to this car other than the fact that the Mustang eventually used the two 89 motor
engine that was used in the original Carroll Shelby Roadster. Now this particular Clifton club
that was designed by the original designer of this particular 1964 coupe was Peter Brock.
Peter Brock designed the shape of this car. And I'm just going to bring this right over
here so that you can see the overall side design of this car. This was an interesting shape because
in 1964, the two 50 GT Ferrari was one of those cars that was absolutely dominating the circuit.
And what Caroll Shelby originally said was there was no way we're going to be able to beat a car
that has a closed top roof with a open top convertible or a Roadster like the
original Cobra. Now, the reason that's important is because the first series
of the Capeland of the Baume Mercier was dedicated to the original Roadster design. So that car
had a lot of different variations. And the number series wound up on the original versions of the
first generation of the Capeland series of the Baume Mercier. So the reason I'm
explaining that is because there's often a little bit of confusion between the Capeland
and the subsequent series, which is the Clifton club that these are Baume Mercier.
CA went through a little bit of change and evolution in the same way that the car went
through the evolution. So that's what makes this particular watch
design point. Important Brock designed this car. He literally the original body off of the
Carroll Shelby Roadster, and then decided he was going to build a canopy to compete with the two 50
Ferrari because they were losing about 20 or 30 miles an hour on the straightaways to the Ferrari,
due to the fact that the car had an open top. So Peter Brock was really instrumental in overall
aerodynamic design. This car is purely iconic race. The original Roadster had to be sold
in order to compete. It had to be sold to the American public. So there are a lot of obsession
points with the original Cobra Roadster this car, however, never quite made it to the road.
The interesting thing about this particular design and race car when Ford was in 1964, when Ford
originally started with this car, they actually switched over to the Ford GT 40 to compete
against Ferrari. And this car never quite made it through the race circuit. And it also never made
it quite into production. Phil Spector was a music producer and he actually bought one of these cars
and made it extremely famous because he drove it through Hollywood. In fact, he drove it so much
that his attorney advised him to stop driving the car because he was getting too many speeding
tickets and it was illegal to be on the road anyway. It wasn't actually allowed to be there
through the DMV didn't actually certify the car. So he was driving illegally anyway,
and they never arrested him or impounded the car, although they threatened many times.
So that car eventually wound up selling for four and a half million dollars. And they, there are
some reproductions of this car that you can find. Why is all of that important? Because every single
thing that we just talked about is included in the design process of this particular Clifton club.
One of the examples is the pushers on the side of the wall right here are actually designed
and made to look like the original pedals, the gas pedal, and the brake pedal and the clutch pedal in
this coupe. So then you move on to the dial of the watch and the dial set up to look like
the instrumentation on the dash of the car. This is, this was really important to Peter Brock. So
this particular car has all kinds of design points that winds up in this watch. The coloration,
the match to the original colors of the card, because not all of them were this bright blue.
Now, when you turn the watch over,
you can see that the internal it's a little bit difficult here, but the internals of the watch,
the rotor that winds, the watch is designed after the wheel design on the car.
So there's all kinds of fun, little points, even the intake great on the side of the watch
is instrumental. just all kinds of fun things, but one of the things that most people notice
the Cobra design on the second hand, the Cobra is the original Shelby Cobra design.
The emblem is actually made into the second hand on this watch, which is a whole lot of fun. Now
they also took there's a little bit of an updated thing because in 1964, they, the carbon fiber idea
wasn't really there, but this is a new modern take on this strap. This is actually a leather strap.
that's embossed to look like a carbon fiber design. When you flip it over the red internal
portions of this particular strap are actually a rubberized material. So it doesn't deteriorate as
quickly over time. It's truly a sports watch. It's also water resistant. You can wear it,
in all kinds of conditions and not have to really worry about it. I probably wouldn't go swimming in
the watch for long periods of time, but it's capable of doing it. It does have the date,
date feature as well. I, the iconic design of this particular watch is absolutely amazing. It's got a
great value story because when you buy pre-owned from us, you get the box and all the goodies that
come with it, as you can see here, the car and the box, the original, complete package,
which is something that you don't see. And then of course, we have a little booklet here that talks
about that and the original design of the car and all the connection points to this Clifton club.
Now, moving on to the other piece here, there's a couple of, these are just two different colors
that we have available, but this is the lighter color design. This is the silver and white. This
is a lot like the original design of the color of the car, because this car wasn't always blue.
So neither were any of the original roasters. In fact, the original Roadsters were
white. Most of the time, the blue didn't appear till later.
So if you really want something, that's a lot of fun. That's connected to American iconic culture.
even though you may not necessarily be a Ford Motor Company fan. And if you're a fan of
Ferrari or other vehicles that are connected to racing and have a long history of racing,
let's imagine you may even have a Caroll Shelby Mustang along the way.
This is a fantastic group of watches to have. We're going to hopefully get some more in,
but we've got these two, the Clifton clubs here to carry you through until we get some
more and you can complete your collection with other colors. So we want you to definitely
keep watching, pay attention to us here at SwissWatchExpo, ring the bell, subscribe,
call us, ask questions. We'll be happy to help you and a Merry Christmas. And hohoho.