7 MINUTES AND 42 SECONDS WITHOUT BREATHING :
FIND OUT WHAT YOU HAVE IN COMMUN WITH HIM

Let's do a test... Take a deep breath and pinch your nose! How long can you stay without breathing? If you are about 1 minute before you catch your breath, then you should know that Guillaume Néry started at the same level as you did.

GUILLAUME NÉRY

CHILD, HE COULDN'T STAND TO HAVE LOST A GAME WITH HIS CLASSMATE ....

Guillaume and his classmate are sitting on the bus. While trying to pass the time, they came up with the idea of a contest: whoever holds their breath the longest has won". His classmate soundly defeats him... And Guillaume can't digest his loss.

He gets it into his head that he will take his revenge and that's when he starts to train by himself, every night, in his little bed.

After a few weeks, he is amazed at pushing his physical limits, beating his own times again and again.

Once his breathing is under control for several minutes, he thinks he could use it to explore the ocean floor.

Moving in the sea means moving in the three dimensions. In apnea, we get rid of gravity and experience our own space travel. The seabed is far from being inert and silent. The bright colors of the anemones make you dizzy and the noise of the fish (yes it makes sounds, there are some examples below) that resonate under the waves offer high emotion shows.

So he decides to join a freediving club.

... AND NOW HE MAKES A SERIES OF WORLD RECORDS !

Nobody sees him, nobody hears him. He is in complete darkness, 139 metres below the waves. His body is deformed under the pressure and his heart beats in slow motion. The performance is silent.

Guillaume Néry is alone at the end of a cable when he breaks the world record of depth in apnea at constant weight. He has only a single blade and a good pair of lungs.

It's not his first try anymore. It has a world record that runs from 2008 to 2015.He has descended to depths we thought impossible. He's gone down in history. He broke the world record for deep sea diving four times and was twice crowned world champion.

It's hard to imagine how he must feel when he reaches his goal, without a shout, without the crowd cheering him like at the end of a marathon. But his wife and his team are always there to provide praise.

But the competition ends just a few metres below the surface, when Guillaume climbs back up from 139 metres in the middle of the field. Something has gone wrong, a few metres below the surface, he faints and has pulmonary oedema just before getting his head out of the water.

Following this accident, the professional freediver offers himself to travelling, photography and writing.

The passion is no longer for sports, it is for Art.

His last film, you have certainly already seen and experimented "One breath around the world". It's a real immersion trip where everyone holds their breath in front of whales, or in the Japanese underwater city. Danger is always present, but it no longer occupies an important place in its practice.

He is always as attentive to risks and takes them for us. It is the mastery of his discipline that brings us to the contemplation of underwater landscapes. Listen, the carp is not dumb. Fish communicate through water where the sound spreads better than in the air. Some are true artists and produce several sounds at the same time.

Research in acoustic communication at the CNRS reveals a wealth of astonishing melodies. Catfish cooing like birds and screaming like a monkey. Others are more discreet and growl or croak like batrachians. You may have already experienced it, your head under water, you hear little "clicks"...

If one day you delve into this subject, you may have the privilege of hearing the long-horned sculpin, which blows like a foghorn when it moves along the seabed.

All its colours, this calm and these noises that break the disturbing silence, this vertiginous atmosphere. This world so little known to the general public has never seemed so beautiful as when it envelops Guillaume Néry in free apnea, in the blue of salt water.