Chikin-Ha, Mexico — Wandering the globe with only a suitcase by her side and her love of the sea propelling her forward, Ai Futaki is setting records, beautifully. But Ai tells DeeperBlue that she didn’t set this most recent Guiness World Record to see what her limit was. As she explains it: “I did it simply to show the beauty of swimming in cave without any air-supply equipment. Only with my own lungs.”
To prepare for her new record dive at the Chikin-Ha cenote in Mexico, Ai completed two months of training in Japan with Mr. Endo. Describing Mr. Endo she says: “He is great trainer of swimming; we worked to change the base of my body so that I would have more core muscle strength. The whole point of this was to swim like a fish… so I did more technique training than apnea. To be honest, I didn’t really do any breath-hold training.”
A local Mayan man blessed Ai with a Mayan ceremony to initiate her attempt and then she was off capturing two new Guinness records for herself. Ai completed a 100 meter dynamic swim that earned her the female title of longest distance in a cave on a single breath-hold dive with a monofin and then a 90 meter dynamic swim without a fin. The current male title holder in this unique discipline is Carlos Coste who set his 150 meter dynamic in a cave in November of 2010.
Freediving for only the past three years, Ai is now dedicating what she does for a living, and everything she persues “to show the beauty of the sea.”