Nick Pelios
Freediver, Creator
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Nick Pelios
Freediver, Creator
William Trubridge is one of the world's deepest men, having freedived unaided on a single breath to a depth of 102 meters (334 feet). He is the founder of Vertical Blue, the most prestigious freediving event in the world, held annually at Dean's Blue Hole, Long Island, Bahamas. Filmmaker Nicolas Rossier spent a few days with him in the Bahamas resulting in "One Breath - The Story Of William Trubridge", a unique portrait that offers a privileged glimpse into Trubridge’s unusual and magical world.
"My name is William Trubridge and I'm here in the Bahamas to train for freediving at Dean's Blue Hole, which is the deepest Blue Hole in the world. I was born in the UK, up in the northern reaches close to Scotland, and my family sold our house there when I was 18 months old in order to buy a boat and sail across the Atlantic, through the Caribbean, across the Pacific, to get to New Zealand. So, I was brought up on the boat, I was always around in the water, playing, snorkeling".
"I got into freediving in 2003. I'd heard that it was a sport and decided to give it a go and travel back to the Caribbean and spent three months just every day diving, morning and afternoon, all the time in the water. And fell in love with a sport and from there it's been kind of non-stop. Freediving is a sport where you hold your breath and go as deep as possible. There are several different disciplines depending on the way that you propel yourself down and up. I specialize in no fins freediving and I hold World Records".
"There are voices that tell me I'm not going to make it, they normally come before a dive, and it's just that they’re kind of devil's advocates, that is sitting on your shoulder and telling you the worst things you could possibly hear. I do a lot of training to access the subconscious mind so that I can turn off the rational reason your mind during a dive. There are a lot of physiological changes that happen to the body during a deep freedive, we're still finding out exactly what happens. The main thing is what's called the blood shift, which is where all the blood is squeezed in from your extremities, and at the same time, your lungs are becoming crushed by the weight of the water column above you. And so you get blood pooling and the lungs.
My wife is fine with the choices that I make. I mean, she does get a little fearful when she's on the surface and I'm doing a deep dive. She’s freediving herself and perhaps by experiencing the sensations, she understands more about where I'm coming from and why I do it. It's a mental sport as much as it is a physical one. One of the beautiful aspects of it is that it kind of forces you to be in the moment. It's almost impossible to be in the water and at the same time contemplate problems. As soon as you get in the water that all dissolves and you're just there".