Natalya Avseenko

Natalya Avseenko is a Russian freediver, born in 1975, who was world champion in the team competition in 2006 and 2008 and who set a constant weight without fins world record of 57 meters in the Bahamas in April 2008. She holds a doctorate in culturology from Moscow State University, where she taught linguistics and intercultural communication until 2007, and she began freediving in 2004 under the guidance of Natalia Molchanova. She founded her own freediving school and took part in a scientific experiment on beluga whales in the White Sea, where she stayed under ice in water at minus two degrees for more than ten minutes. She was also featured in a photographic series by Viktor Lyagushkin about the Orda Cave in the Ural Mountains.