In the last two years, Chennai-based Illayaram Sekar has spent most of his time submerged in water, in a glass tank. And now, he has emerged with a Guinness World Record for the most number of Rubik’s cubes solved under water, in one breath. That is, six cubes in two minutes and 17 seconds. He achieved this feat earlier this month. But this is not his first Guinness title. The 25-year-old holds two others.

“The first one was in 2016, when I solved 700 Rubik’s cubes in six hours 19 minutes, while cycling continuously. The previous record holder had managed to solve 111,” says Illayaram on phone. The other record includes “Most number of People solving Rubik’s Cube”, for which he trained 3,997 students of Kaligi Ranganathan Montford Schools, Chennai. Incidentally, he is a full-time cube trainer at this institution, perhaps the only one to have such a session as part of its curriculum. While the underwater feat was one of the most challenging, Illayaram says, training students was just as tough. “As an individual, you know how much effort to put in and what exactly to do but when you make someone do it, it’s not the same. It took me two years to train them,” he says.

The fascination with the cube started in 2013 when Illayaram was in college. “Once I solved my first cube, I was encouraged and watched a lot of videos on YouTube to learn more skills,” he says. He recalls participating in his first-ever cube solving competition in college, where he was eliminated in the first round. He decided to turn things around the next year and ended up the winner. “I solved it in nine seconds and the person who finished second took three-and-a- half minutes to solve it,” he laughs.

Preparation is important, he says, adding that even now there is so much to learn. Illayaram is also constantly thinking of new ways to challenge himself. When he started preparing for the underwater record, a two-and-a-half-feet airtight water tank was built for him to practise in. “At first I could only hold my breath for 10 seconds. Eventually, the duration increased. If you are not doing anything else, it is possible to hold your breath for longer but here I had to solve the cube as well. The pressure of the water was not allowing me to work as fast as I normally do. Sometimes it would take me as long as 18 seconds to solve it underwater,” he says.

In the meantime, the serial record seeker has also submitted another evidence to Guinness World Records, for the most number of cubes solved while hanging upside down: 72 in 26 minutes. And he is currently learning to ride a unicyle for his next record attempt.