Free Diver Swims to Bottom of World’s Deepest Pool in One Breath

Every kid in the world does the same two things when they are in a swimming pool: they try to go the length of the pool entirely under water, and they see how long they can hold their breath at the bottom. But not every kid grows up and combines those two tasks into one amazing deep dive done in a single breath.In this video French free diver Guillaume Néry swims to the floor of the deepest pool in the world, The Deep Joy Y-40 of the Hotel Terme Millepini in Padua, Italy, and he does it without any breathing apparatus.At 40 meters deep (a little over 131 feet), it’s hard to imagine what this feels like in terms of the pressure it must put on Néry (think about how your ears hurt at the bottom of a ten foot pool), but the fact he does this without oxygen makes it surreal. Almost dreamlike.

Every time he reaches a new level, you think that must be the bottom, but then he just keeps going and going, like a real life Aquaman. I don’t know if this is more beautiful than terrifying to watch, but either way it’s impossible to look away. This isn’t even Néry’s deepest dive. In 2011, he set a record by plunging almost three times deeper, down to 117 meters.As for the pool itself, it “contains 4300mc of thermal water kept at a temperature of between 32-34°C” (roughly 90 degrees), and is used for a myriad of reasons, from scuba training to filming movies.

Image: Guillaume Néry