We got a chance to go hands-on with the £1m graphene-cased split-seconds chronograph
By Chris Hall

This is the first watch produced under Richard Mille’s partnership with McLaren. It’s a split-seconds chronograph tourbillon, but it’s so much more than that. 
Or should that be “so much less”" This watch – including the strap – weighs just under 40 grams. That’s a new world record for a chronograph, and makes for a seriously dissonant experience. Pick it up and you jerk your hand reflexively in anticipation of having more weight to lift. When you’re wearing it with the “comfort strap”, pictured, there is no sensation like the feeling you might have left a £1 million watch lying around somewhere – because it’s so light you genuinely can’t tell its on your wrist. 
The insane weight savings (and the price, to an extent) are down to Richard Mille’s persistent pursuit of ever-more advanced materials for its cases, and a ruthless regime of skeletonisation. The diet this movement has been on would make Fernando Alonso’s training routine look positively indulgent; it weighs just seven grams, total. When you think of how many components are required (Richard Mille hasn’t given a precise figure, but it must be north of 300), it’s a staggering achievement. The movement is made mostly from titanium and hangs in a cage of TPT carbon. 

The case looks like a &...