Watch Paparazzi

Athlete Julian Alaphilippe spotted wearing Richard Mille

Julian Alaphilippe, the French cycling phenomenon and double UCI Road World Champion, was recently spotted wearing a Richard Mille RM 67-02 — not just any variant, but the edition conceived specifically for rally legend Sébastien Ogier. The sighting is noteworthy precisely because professional cyclists treat wrist weight the way sprinters treat wind resistance: something to be eliminated entirely. The fact that Alaphilippe is seen wearing any watch at all is a story. That it happens to be one of the most technically sophisticated ultra-thin sports watches on the market makes it a considerably bigger one.

The Richard Mille RM 67-02 was introduced as the brand's answer to a genuine engineering question: how thin can you go while maintaining the structural integrity and shock resistance that professional athletes demand? The answer arrived in the form of a case measuring just 7.75mm in thickness, constructed from Carbon TPT — Richard Mille's proprietary material composed of hundreds of layers of carbon filament laid at alternating 45-degree angles and infused with a tinted resin matrix. The result is a case that weighs virtually nothing, resists deformation under lateral stress, and produces a unique marbled surface pattern that is unrepeatable between pieces. The Ogier edition incorporates colour accents referencing rally livery aesthetics, distinguishing it visually from the base RM 67-02 reference.

Powering the watch is the calibre CRMA7, an in-house automatic movement with a skeletonised architecture, variable geometry rotor, and a power reserve of approximately 50 hours. Grade 5 titanium is used extensively throughout the movement architecture to reduce mass, a philosophy consistent with the broader RM 67-02 design brief. The total weight of the complete watch sits around 32 grams — genuinely competitive with high-end sports chronographs that make no such mechanical claims.

The Ogier collaboration fits within Richard Mille's long-standing strategy of developing athlete-specific editions that function as genuine tool watches rather than ceremonial endorsements. From Rafael Nadal's RM 27 series surviving the torque of a tennis serve to Odell Beckham Jr.'s RM 11-03 enduring an NFL game, the brand has consistently placed its timepieces in conditions where failure would be public and costly. Alaphilippe wearing the Ogier RM 67-02 extends that narrative into professional cycling's unforgiving physical environment.

On the secondary market, the Richard Mille RM 67-02 in its athlete edition configurations commands strong premiums over retail, driven by limited production allocations and robust demand from collectors who view Richard Mille's sports collaborations as both culturally significant and appreciating assets. Retail pricing for the RM 67-02 sits in the upper five-figure to low six-figure range depending on configuration, while grey-market values have historically traded above list.