{"id":329512,"date":"2025-12-05T13:58:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T13:58:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/329512\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T13:58:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T13:58:10","slug":"mercedes-gleitzes-english-channel-rolex-sells-for-1-73-million","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/329512\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercedes Gleitze\u2019s English Channel Rolex Sells for $1.73 Million"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Image: Courtesy Sotheby\u2019s and Getty.<\/p>\n

WHEN MERCEDES GLEITZE stepped into the English Channel in 1927, she wasn\u2019t doing it for applause. She\u2019d already swum her way into the history books earlier that month. This second attempt \u2013 the colder, harsher one \u2013 was different. <\/p>\n

Someone had tried to diminish her first crossing, and she wasn\u2019t having it. So she walked back into water that could flatten even the strongest swimmer, purely to silence the noise.<\/p>\n

Around her neck was a 27 mm gold Rolex Oyster, tied on with a ribbon, barely noticeable against the enormity of the moment. It looked delicate, almost decorative \u2013 the kind of thing you\u2019d take off before washing your hands.<\/p>\n

But it wasn\u2019t decorative at all. It was one of the earliest waterproof prototypes Rolex had ever made, and it was about to be thrown into one of the toughest environments on Earth.<\/p>\n

Last month, that same watch sold at Sotheby\u2019s in Geneva for a whopping USD $1.73 million. And honestly, when you know the backstory, the number feels almost understated. This isn\u2019t a watch that lived in a velvet-lined box. It wasn\u2019t a safe queen. It survived hours of freezing currents, stayed intact, stayed dry and \u2013 crucially \u2013 stayed running.<\/p>\n

\"\"Gleitze in the English Channel during her famed \u201cVindication Swim.\u201d\u00a0E. Bacon\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

\"\"Sotheby\u2019s<\/p>\n

Gleitze didn\u2019t make it across that day. The cold forced her out before she could finish. But the watch? It behaved exactly the way Rolex had spent years promising it would. In an era where most \u201cwaterproof\u201d claims crumbled under a strong breeze, this Oyster quietly validated the entire concept.<\/p>\n

At the auction last month, three bidders went hard before an Asian private collector finally claimed it \u2013 all during a week where a Breguet four-minute tourbillon cleared $2.3 million, a George Daniels clock rewrote its own estimate, and even a Cartier Baignoire decided to set a record. Geneva was showing off. <\/p>\n

But somehow the watch people kept coming back to wasn\u2019t the loudest, the heaviest, or the most complicated. It was the smallest one in the room.<\/p>\n

You can buy craftsmanship. You can buy rarity. You can buy gemstones, complications, cases milled to five decimal points. But you can\u2019t buy a story like this. Not one backed by cold water, human grit and a woman who refused to let anyone else write her ending.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Related:<\/p>\n

The CEO of Rolex gave a rare interview \u2013 here are 14 lessons we learned<\/a><\/p>\n

Tom Cruise finally won an Oscar and he wore a very rare, and expensive Rolex to receive it<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Image: Courtesy Sotheby\u2019s and Getty. WHEN MERCEDES GLEITZE stepped into the English Channel in 1927, she wasn\u2019t doing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":329513,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[64,63,38079,105],"class_list":["post-329512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rolex","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=329512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/329512\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/329513"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=329512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=329512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=329512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}