Publisher Note: Somehow during the past couple of weeks we missed putting out this news item. Whilst it is no longer new "news" we felt it necessary to report it.
On Sunday, October 2th Austrian Herbert Nitsch (35), in the Croatian town of Sibenik, set a new absolute world record in freediving to 172m in the discipline of No Limits.
No Limits is the deepest discipline in FreeDiving and allows the athlete to use the equipment of his choice. In most cases this is a weighted sled, suspended on a rope, that drags the freediver into the deep. A lifting bag (balloon) brings him back to the surface.
The depth of 172m (18 bars), which is 9 times the pressure within a car tyre. The lung of a freediver is being compressed to the size of prune.
This record was recognised by AIDA and is now the official AIDA World Record for No Limits.
This comes just weeks after the Belgian FreeDiver, Patrick Musimu, set a non-AIDA record of 209.6m. Patrick refused to let AIDA ratify his record and set the FreeDiving world alight with discussion on his tremendous dive.