Captain Cook High-Tech Ceramic Chronograph

Rado Captain Cook High-Tech Ceramic Chronograph
RUGGED, ATHLETIC AND DEVASTATINGLY GOOD LOOKING
Outdoorsy and metropolitan? Sporty yet sophisticated? The new Rado Captain Cook High-Tech Ceramic Chronograph attains the unattainable...

For one, that’s because it might just be the most dynamic example of the entire Captain Cook family of timepieces, already well known for its rugged good looks and utilitarian functionality, thanks to its chronograph. For anyone that needs precision timing on or under the water, on the slopes or at the
racetrack, we got you.

But it’s also undeniably stylish, presented here in two contemporary colourways that help it flex from the great outdoors to life in the big city. For 2025, choose from black and rose gold, like the urban skyline at night, or plasma and dark green – a first for the Captain Cook series – that captures the look and feel of the concrete jungle.

Perfect balance
And that’s the point of the Rado Captain Cook High-Tech Ceramic Chronograph – a performance watch that can be relied upon in the wildest of locations, yet which also looks great with workwear, in social situations and even during more fashion-oriented occasions, because it doesn’t look overly sporty. Almost impossibly, it effortlessly bridges different worlds.

Its athletic credentials emerge through the choice of materials. Both watches represent the first time a high-tech ceramic monobloc case has been deployed for Captain Cook chronographs. And with high-tech ceramic across bezel insert and bracelet, it’s unbelievably lightweight – wearing it feels like second nature – as well as being incredibly scratch resistant. Its box-shaped sapphire crystal is similarly impervious to scratches and the case is water resistant to 30 bar, featuring a screw-down crown and two screw-down chronograph pushers to prevent water ingress. So it’s great in the field, capable in almost any scenario.

Contemporary opulence
Beyond its sporting kudos, discover fashionable aesthetics. The black and rose gold-coloured Rado Captain Cook High-Tech Ceramic Chronograph boasts ‘two-tone’ black ceramics: a polished high-tech ceramic bezel insert and polished middle bracelet links contrast with a matt high-tech ceramic case and
matt outer bracelet links. Along with a black dial, it’s all beautifully shadowy. Rose gold-coloured embellishments – across bezel, hands, indexes, pushers and crown – bring contemporary style.

Its plasma high-tech ceramic sibling also features dual finishes on the bracelet, with polished plasma middle links flanked by matt components. Add in the stainless steel bezel, crown and pushers and the rhodium-coloured hands and indices, and it offers up an intriguing mix of metallic finishes. But it’s the
bezel’s ceramic insert, in a dark, sumptuous green, with a polished finish, and a dial in a matching shade, that signals pure opulence.

Less is more
In outdoor pursuits, at-a-glance accuracy is essential, and that comes easy with substantial hour and minute hands that point to equally purposeful indexes – all of which are finished with white Super-LumiNova®. The second, minute and hour chronograph hands all sport a painted red tip for easy identification.

Overall, the dial feels supremely well balanced, with its three subdials lending an unmistakeable sense of energy – a chrono hour counter is a new addition to Captain Cook chronographs. Rado’s moving anchor symbol is at 12 o’clock, rotating on a synthetic ruby backplate, and there’s a trapezoidal date window at 6 o’clock shaped to match the indexes. Around the edge runs a subtle minute track, surrounded by a turning bezel with deliberately spartan engraved markings.

Collectively, it’s all a brilliant demonstration of ‘less is more’ – which helps explain why the piece never feels too energetic. This approach also applies to the Rado calibre R801 automatic movement, featuring a 59-hour power reserve, whose svelte dimensions mean the height of the case, including the crystal, measures just 16.2mm – making it easy to accessorise an outfit.

Balancing sporty with stylish is a claim made frequently in watchmaking, but the Rado Captain Cook High-Tech Ceramic Chronograph irrefutably owns both characteristics – without compromising on either.

Why High-Tech Ceramic? – Because it feels like nothing else...
This is exactly what Rado high-tech ceramic is all about. It's why we say, "Feel it." The ancient origins of its base material render its durability almost inevitable, but it is indeed a great testimonial to the know-how and experience of the "Master of Materials" that it has proven to be true. High-tech ceramic is a beautifully light substance, and one that is also magnificently scratch-resistant.

In itself, all that might be enough qualities to love, in one exceptional material, but surprisingly, it doesn't stop there. Not only is ceramic durable and impervious to almost everything, it has a rare silkiness to the touch that makes for exquisite comfort against the skin. Place it over a human wrist — fine, large, gentle or rugged, and it feels like it was made to be there — since forever. This is of course particularly true for timepieces making use of ceramic elements also in their bracelet, where the sensory experience becomes total and absolutely unforgettable.

About High-Tech Ceramic
Chronologically-speaking, high-tech ceramic was first introduced by Rado in 1986. Its sensuous feel, durability, scratch resistance and surprising light weight quickly conquered the hearts of watch enthusiasts the world over. Though related in some respects to more common forms of ceramics we all know, high-tech ceramic is truly a product of advanced science. Under highly exacting conditions, extremely pure and finely calibrated powders of zirconium oxide with perfectly uniform grain sizes, are shaped into a particular form then baked at high temperature to create an object or a watch case of the desired dimensions and properties. New methods developed by Rado involve the use of a plastic carrier medium mixed with the mineral powders, to allow injection into precision moulds at pressures around 1000 bar. Once cooled, the pieces are removed from their parent mould and the carrier agent dissolved in a standard chemical solvent process, prior to a final sintering phase at 1,450°C. This precisely controlled sintering is what makes possible the extraordinary level of full density and hardness of high-tech ceramic, over regular ceramic. The procedure is true rocket-science territory, as the dimensions of the first moulded elements shrink during sintering; the particles tighten up as porosity disappears and precise calculations must take into account this important change of around 25% in the dimensions. The reward is a case that now stands at 1,250 on the Vickers scale and is ready for final diamond-tool machining and finishing, into an impressive Rado timepiece.