PROFILE

UMBERTO PELIZZARI was born on the 28th August 1965 in Busto Arsizio, in the province of Varese. He is 1.89 metres tall and weighs 84 kg, and his lung capacity is 7.9 litres. By the age of 5 he can already swim perfectly and by the age of 17 he already had 11 seasons of swimming behind him at a professional level. In 1984 he begins to dedicate himself to apnea. He reaches his first world record in 1988 when, with 5'33", he establishes the record in static apnea. Having become a member of the NO LIMITS SECTOR Team, on 19th May 1990 - in the public pool of Busto Arsizio - he breaks the world record of static apnea, beating the previous record of 5'50" established by the French Philippe Goasse with 6'03". On the 12th of July, 1990, he earns a degree in Information Science at the University of Milan. In the meantime he has started training, with the goal of breaking the world record on the Isle of Elba. On the 10th of November, on the same year, in Porto Azzurro, Umberto amazes everybody by reaching a new world record of immersion apnea in constant weight, reaching a depth of 65 metres even though he has just started to participate in this difficult discipline. He beat Pipin Ferreras' record by 3 metres which had been established only two months earlier. In Hawaii, on the 9th July 1991, he reclaims the record in static apnea with 7'02"88, smashing the old record of 6'40" held by the French Michael Bader. In this discipline, his best performance is now 8 minutes. In 1995, during a medical test held by Prof. Piergiorgio Data, at the University of Underwater Medicine in Chieti, after 8 minutes breathing pure oxygen, Umberto Pelizzari holds his breath for 19'56''. September 1991, on the Isle of Elba, he conquers all the records of immersion apnea. The 3rd of October sees him descend in constant weight to a depth of 67 metres, improving his previous record by 2 metres. On the 22nd of October, Umberto reaches a world record of immersion apnea in variable weight, reaching -95 metres, improving the record established by Pipin in September 1990 in Milazzo, by 3 metres. On the 26th of October, he obtains his third world record in a month, beating the absolute record in immersion apnea with -118 metres (but in 1992 this record is broken with -120 metres by a Cuban rival). On September 17th, 1992, in Ustica, Umberto reclaims the world record of immersion apnea in constant weight with -70 metres, which he lost to Pipin on the 27th of May. On the 11th of October 1993, off-shore of Montecristo, he establishes a new record in "no limits", variable weight, descending to a depth of 123 metres. Umberto holds this record only until the 14th of the next month, when in Grand Bahama, Pipin improves on it with -125 metres. On July 24th 1994, at Cala Gonone-Dorgali, in Sardegna, Umberto reaches his new world record in immersion in apnea in the Variable Ballast discipline descending to a depth of 101 metres.

In July 1995, at Villasimius in Sardegna, he claims two new world records: -72 metres in constant weight (16th July) and -105 metres in variable weight (only to see Gianluca Genoni break his record by only a metre on the 17th of August 1996). 

In 1996, again in Villasimius, he once again achieves a double world record: on the 9th of September is with -110 metres, he takes the world record again in variable weight and on the 16th of the same month, with -131 metres, he takes away Pipin's record in "No limits", variable weight. On the 13th of September 1997, at Porto Venere in Liguria, he again conquers the world record in constant weight with a depth of 75 metres, beating the Cuban Alessandro Ravelo at -73 metres. On the 20th of September against the same Cuban competitor, Umberto wins the records in variable weight, descending to 115 metres. In 1999, Umberto Pelizzari once again holds all records for freediving in the world. On the 18th of October '99, during the Genoa Boat Show, four miles away from the Cape of Portofino, Umberto establishes a new world record in the discipline of Constant Weight, with a dive of 80 meters. This improves the record by 4 meters, set by the Cuban Alejandro Ravelo in August 1998 in Sicily. On the 24th of October 1999, with the technical support of Nave Anteo (a 97 meters long boat of the Italian Navy), Umberto makes history with a dive to a depth which was considered impossible for man by underwater medicine. He descends to 150 meters in the discipline of "No limits", variable weight. After a dive of 2'57", he is again the Man with the Deepest Dive in the World. In 2000, Umberto Pelizzari is involved in the making of the film OceanMen, produced by IMAX (2D), which tells the story of two great free-divers: Umberto and Pipin. In October 2001, the Italian National Team comprising Umberto Pelizzari, Davide Carrera and Gaspare Battaglia won the gold medal at the Freediving World Championship by Team, held in the Club Med Resort in Ibiza. Once again in October, Mursia (Biblioteca del Mare) published the first free-diving illustrated manual, written by Umberto and Stefano Tovaglieri. 2001 is a magical year for Umberto; on the 3rd of November in the waters of Capri, he established a new free-diving World Record in Variable Weight. The athlete dived to 131 meters and back in 2'44", beating Genoni's record by 5 meters. This is a great performance, considering that in 1996, Pelizzari ascended to the surface from the depth of 131 meters with balloons during the No Limits World Record. Umberto dedicated this record to everyone who has supported him these past 11 years and ... in glory he retires from official individual competitions. At this moment Umberto is working as a journalist and reporter in television programs about science spreading and ocean environments. He created Apnea Academy, a school for freediving, researching, teaching and spreading to world-wide level. The Ministry of the Interior nominated him as a component of teaching group for courses of National Fire Department scuba divers. Since 2006 he's worked as a teacher in Superior Normal School S.Anna in Pisa, at the second level Master of Underwater and Iperbaric Medicine. Since September 2013, he's been a teacher in the PHD of Underwater and Hiperbaric Medicine at the University of Palermo