Watch Paparazzi

Footballer Karim Benzema spotted wearing Richard Mille

Karim Benzema was recently spotted wearing a Richard Mille RM 055 'Bubba Watson', the titanium-cased skeletonized manual-winder that Richard Mille developed alongside left-handed golf phenomenon Bubba Watson. The sighting adds another flagship piece to a wrist portfolio that has made Benzema one of the most-watched watch collectors in professional football.

The Richard Mille RM 055 was introduced in 2011 as a direct collaboration with Bubba Watson, then rising to become one of the most unconventional ball-strikers on the PGA Tour. The watch's architecture reflects the sport's demands precisely: a featherlight titanium grade 5 case, reinforced by a front bezel machined from ceramic ATZ — aluminum oxide zirconia toughened — a material harder than steel and practically impervious to the abrasion a golfer's sleeve generates through thousands of practice swings. The skeletonized CRMA1 manual-winding movement, developed in-house by Richard Mille, exposes its baseplate and bridges to the eye while eliminating every gram of unnecessary material. The result is a watch that sits almost imperceptibly on the wrist despite its 49.9mm case diameter.

Among collectors, the RM 055 'Bubba Watson' occupies a specific niche: it is one of Richard Mille's cleaner, sport-pure references, without the complication density of the tourbillon models but carrying the full brand ethos of motorsport-grade material science applied to horology. Its legibility — large Arabic numerals, a skeletonized dial that still reads quickly — made it a practical tool watch framed in a six-figure case. First-generation examples in particular hold strong interest on the secondary market.

Benzema's relationship with Richard Mille is well established. The former Real Madrid striker and 2022 Ballon d'Or winner has worn multiple references from the brand over the years, and the choice of the RM 055 rather than a more ostentatious complication speaks to some discernment — this is a watch built around a coherent performance brief, not pure status signaling.

At retail the Richard Mille RM 055 'Bubba Watson' carries a list price in the $190,000–$210,000 range depending on configuration, with grey-market values tracking closely given consistent collector demand for named-collaboration Richard Mille sport references.