Canadian freediver and Save our Seas Foundation project leader, William Winram, has broken the CMAS world record for the Variable Weight, No Fins freediving discipline by almost 30m.
Variable Weight, No Fins (VWT-NF) freediving involves the participant riding a weighted sled to depth, before returning to the surface under their own power – in this case, without fins. Winram – who is 58 years of age – announced on Facebook that he had broken the previous record of 111m on 11 December 2023, with a dive to 140m off the coast of Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
‘After the world record on the first day of the event and a few 135m dives where I ran out of air for equalisation,’ said Winram in his post, ‘I kept at it working dry on the EQ skills on the rest days. I am happy to report that I nailed a new world record at 140m yesterday, with air to spare at the bottom.
Winram grew up on the west coast of Canada and began freediving at a young age, but didn’t start competitive freediving until his late 30s, in 2005. He rose quickly through the rankings becoming the top-ranked male freediver in the 2006 world championships.
In 2008, he was invited by the Malpelo Foundation in Colombia to use his breath-hold diving skills to assist in shark-tagging, as the lack of noisy scuba gear is less likely to scare off the sharks.
Following his experience tagging scalloped hammerheads in Malpelo, he began work an initiative he named the Watermen Project, which supports shark research by buying tags and receivers for shark scientists, and assisting with their deployment.
