FORMER ME sufferer Gwen Cook and cycle partner Lea Marshall are celebrating after breaking three national cycling tandem records.

Cook, 42, took her latest crown when she and Marshall sliced more than five minutes off the UK National Ladies’ Tandem 100-mile time trial record at Attleborough, Norfolk.

The dynamic duo endured pain and exhaustion to finish the course in 4hrs 4mins 15 seconds, beating the previous record set in 1981, and averaging 24.56mph.

Schoolteacher Cook, from Leigh, and Marshall, from Billericay, also broke the 10-mile record in 2008 with a time of 20 minutes, and the 25-mile record last summer, with a time of just over 51 minutes.

Mum-of-four Cook, who rides pilot on the Condor tandem bike, said: “We were held up at a roundabout and that’s the only reason we finished second. By the end of the race I was shattered. My legs were very tired and my arms were sore.

“I’m on the front of the tandem and have to hold the bike up and after about 70 miles my shoulders were in agony.

“But we’re a determined pair and there was no way we were going to give up.

“When we finished we couldn’t believe we had broken the record. It was overwhelming.”

It was no mean feat for Cook, who became ill with ME in the mid-nineties and then had four children in just four years.

She added: “Once life settled down after the children and I got better, I began to get back to cycling.

“I’d cycled since I was a youngster but had to give up when I became ill.

“In 2006 I teamed up with Lea and the rest is history.”

Cook, who cycles for the Essex Roads Cycling Club, now spends most weekends during the summer racing with Lea, 42.

It means husband Alan, 43, is usually left to look after Luke and Ruth, eight, Matthew, 12, and Joshua, 13, or watch from the sidelines. He said: “It’s always quite mixed for me watching Gwen race as I am concerned for her safety but excited at her doing well. I’m very proud of her.”

Luke, who is a pupil at Leigh North Street Junior School, added: “We weren’t really expecting mum to beat the record as she hadn’t really trained for it. But we are all proud of her.”