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tennis playerSpotted June 2023

Tennis player Gaël Monfils spotted wearing a Roger Dubuis

tennis player Gaël Monfils spotted wearing a Roger Dubuis RD105SQ
Who & what: Roger Dubuis Excalibur Double Flying Tourbillon Skeleton RD105SQ – 8-Piece Limited Edition Spotted on Gaël Monfils

Gaël Monfils was recently spotted wearing what is arguably one of the most audacious pieces in the Roger Dubuis catalogue: the Excalibur Skeleton Double Flying Tourbillon, reference RD105SQ, produced in a strictly limited series of eight examples. For a watch this rare to appear on a public wrist — even one belonging to a high-profile athlete — is a genuine sighting worth examining closely.

The RD105SQ is powered by the in-house calibre RD105SQ, a hand-wound skeletonized movement engineered around two independent flying tourbillon cages. 'Flying' here means the cages operate without an upper bridge, creating an unobstructed view of both regulators in motion simultaneously. The architecture is fully openworked, with each component reduced to its structural minimum, revealing the kinetic choreography beneath. Roger Dubuis submits every movement to the Poinçon de Genève — the Geneva Seal — a voluntary certification requiring strict standards of finishing, fit, and provenance. Achieving that hallmark on a double flying tourbillon skeleton is no small administrative feat.

From a collector's standpoint, the RD105SQ occupies a very specific niche: it is a Geneva Seal-certified, double flying tourbillon in a production run of eight. Single flying tourbillons already command serious attention; doubling the complication while maintaining Seal compliance pushes this piece into a category occupied by almost no other manufacturer. Roger Dubuis has built its identity around what it calls 'Hyper Horology' — a commitment to complications that exist at the outer edge of mechanical feasibility — and the RD105SQ is a credible embodiment of that positioning rather than a marketing abstraction.

Monfils has long cultivated a reputation as one of tennis's most expressive personalities, and his watch choices consistently reflect that. He is a documented Roger Dubuis ambassador, making this sighting less a coincidence than a statement of genuine affinity. The RD105SQ's visual drama — open dials, rotating tourbillon cages, skeletonized bridges — maps naturally onto his on-court theatrics.

With only eight examples in existence, the RD105SQ has no meaningful grey market. Pieces of this scarcity trade privately, when they trade at all, and typically at premiums that bear little relationship to original retail. For collectors, availability is the real obstacle.

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