Spot the Watch: Wout van Aert and his Rolex Daytona

We just spotted on an instagram post by professional cyclist Wout van Aert and his wife Sarah Sarah de Bie announcing the birth of his second son – Jerome. On his wrist – a Rolex Datytona.

Wout, a Belgian is a top level professional cyclist riding for the UCI World Tour team of Jumbo Wisma, a Dutch team. Wout has a very impressive palmarès, including Cyclocross World Champion for 2016, 17, 18 and the Points Classification (the prize for best sprinter) for the Tour de France 2022. He had a good Tour de France for 2023, and though not as spectacular as his performance in 2022 (with 4 stage wins), was a powerhouse in the team which helped leader Jonas Vingegaard to win the Tour de France 2023, ahead of his main rival and crowd favourite Tadej Pogačar of UAE Team Emirates. Wout was given permission to leave the race after Stage 17 of the 21 stage race, to be with wife for the birth of his son.

On Wout’s wrist in his post is the Rolex Cosmograph Daytona Ref. 116500LN in a black dial, aka Godzilla.

As far as we know, Jumbo Wisma is not sponsored by any watch brand, while UAE has Richard Mille as one of their sponsors. Tadej’s Richard Mille was stolen from the team hotel during the 2023 Paris-Nice race, a race which he won. While the team sponsor watch is the RM67-02, it is unclear what was the reference of the stolen watch. The watch was a gift from Richard Mille after the Olympic Games in Tokyo. “It was a special watch for me,”  Pogačar was reported to have told the court. “I find it curious that they could sell it so quickly, with no box or documentation.”