by Kyle Stults on May 21, 2010
Way to go Freediving!
Well, it didn’t take long for luxury watch brands to start their own bit of competition within the already competitive sport of freediving — Breitling just announced that it has signed Austrian Herbert Nitsch to be a brand Ambassador. Prior to Breitling, the only major sponsorship I was aware of was BALL Watch Co.’s sponsorship, which I profiled in great detail earlier this year — see For the Apnea Enthusiast: BALL EMII Diver World Time, March 25, 2010.
This says quite a lot about the relatively obscure sport of freediving, doesn’t it? I mean seriously — how many people take part in this extreme sport? Not many. But now we have two high profile Swiss-watch brands sponsoring competing athletes.
From what I can tell, Nitsch is the King of freediving and thus an appropriate pick for Breitling:
Nitsch is a current world record holder 3 of the 8 categories officially recognized by AIDA International — Constant Weight Apnea (124 meters — madness), Variable Weight Apnea (142 meters — insane madness), and No Limits Apnea (214 meters — beyond insane madness). Yes it gets even crazier, but I’ll leave a discussion of the Dynamic Apnea with Fins category (250 meters is current WR) for another day.
I must say that I am utterly fascinated at the depths that have been achieved by these guys — they seem beyond human! Here’s Nitsch in action:
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