n a collaboration that shatters convention, Ulysse Nardin, the award-winning Swiss watch manufacture behind the Freak and the mavericks behind Gumball 3000 are coming together to mark the 25th anniversary of the world’s most rock-and-roll rally. Introducing the Freak X Gumball 3000 Limited Edition, a watch for the bold and the brave.

This limited-edition watch will be produced in just 150 pieces, with each Gumball 3000 driver having the option to personalise theirs with a dedication plate featuring their specific team number, celebrating the 25th anniversary of the rally.

Since 1999, Maximillion Cooper has led a convoy of mavericks on a 3,000-mile odyssey that transcends speed and style. Gumball 3000 isn’t about the destination, it’s about the ride, the challenges, and the stories created along the way. For 25 years, the eccentric endurance event has attracted an eclectic mix of visionaries: sheikhs, rockstars, artists, and entrepreneurs, all united by a shared lust for adrenaline and adventure.

The 2024 edition roars through Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia before culminating in the electric atmosphere of Singapore’s F1 Grand Prix. This year’s route takes participants from the backroads of Saigon to the bustling streets of Bangkok, blending chaos, luxury, and adventure at every turn - a theme Gumball has pioneered for 25 unforgettable years.

Maximillian Cooper, Founder of Gumball 3000, stated: “Celebrating 25 years of Gumball 3000 is a huge milestone, and partnering with Ulysse Nardin to create something truly special felt like the perfect way to mark it. Each driver will have the opportunity to customise their Freak X watch to match their team number, making it a tribute to the spirit of individuality and adventure that defines our rally. Just like Gumball, the Freak X breaks the mould. It’s bold, unconventional, and engineered for those who aren’t afraid to push boundaries.”

Since 1846, Ulysse Nardin has been rewriting the rulebook on watchmaking. Amongst its wildest creations is the Freak that epitomises the impact of Ulysse Nardin on modern high horology. Launched in 2001, the Freak shocked the watchmaking world in the way it defied and reconfigured centuries-old norms, fomenting a revolution on three fronts: design, mechanical and material. With no hands, no dial, no crown, its design was revolutionary: it was the first wristwatch wherein mechanics and aesthetics were virtually indistinguishable and where movement design was an extreme exercise in aesthetics. The Freak was aptly named as it bore little resemblance to anything ever worn on the wrist. It was a watch whose primary purpose was to convey an emotional or an artistic expression of time.

The Freak also initiated a mechanical revolution as it marked the first instance that a movement was deconstructed to express time on its own and, in so doing, achieved a totally new, mechanics-celebratory language of watchmaking that will come to inform much of what contemporary watchmaking embodies today.

The Freak pioneered maverick technologies that now define 21st century mechanical watchmaking. It was the first watch to incorporate silicon parts, thereby ushering in the age of silicon in watchmaking.

The award-winner Freak is a symbol for every rule breaker and iconoclast, for any individual who rejects the status quo, blazes their path to the top and, despite innumerable challenges, aims to succeed with their integrity intact.

The special edition watch, limited to just 150 pieces, is a striking fusion of cutting-edge high horology and Gumball’s unmistakable rebellious energy. The watch features a bold, personalised display case-back etched with the iconic Gumball 3000 logo, a lightweight forged Carbonium case, and iridescent Gumball orange Super-LumiNova on the hour markers - completed with vivid Delugs^® orange rubber strap.

Each watch will initially be offered exclusively to drivers of Gumball 3000’s 25th anniversary rally this September, providing Gumballers an opportunity to immortalise their once in a lifetime memories with a timepiece that matches the team number of their rally car. Further enquires are now being taken on the Freak X GB3K website. With only 150 pieces available worldwide this edition is set to be one of Ulysse Nardin’s most exclusive and sought-after releases.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Reference
2303-270LE-2A-GUM/3A

• Calibre UN-230 Manufacture
• Automatic movement
• Hours, minutes
• Flying carrousel movement rotating around its own axis
• Balance wheel and escapement in silicon
• Oversised oscillator
• Black DLC hour disc
• Index in white Super-LumiNova, bridges in orange Super-LumiNova
• 206 Components / 21 jewels
• Frequency 3 Hz / oscillations 21’600 V/H
• Black DLC titanium satin finish case
• Side parts in Carbonium with matte finish
• Personalised opened case back «Gumball 3000»
• Personalised side plate number in orange colour
• 43 mm 72 hours 50 m
• Orange rubber strap “Delugs^® for Ulysse-Nardin” Black DLC titanium folding buckle