DESPITE pounding the treadmill for a week, runner Sharon Gayter described smashing two world endurance records as “far too easy”.

By the time she stepped off the running machine at noon yesterday, Mrs Gayter, 48, from Guisborough, east Cleveland, had beaten the mark of female record holder and grandmother Mimi Anderson, who ran 650km (403.81 miles), by 182.73km (113.5miles), and the male world record holder, Lee Chamberlain, who ran 753.24km (468.04 miles) in July 2009, by 79.33km (49.29miles).

“I would much rather have been out on the road even if it had been cold and wet,” she said from the comfort of the Olympia Building at Teesside University in Middlesbrough, where she achieved her feat.

“My last race was 130 miles, but this felt too easy because I had a good time behind me and I ran at a pace that was comfortable.

The first five and the last five minutes were at the same pace so maybe I should have gone faster.”

Mrs Gayter added with a smile: “I would like to see the men come and challenge my new world record – I have got my doubts that they can.”

To beat the previous Guinness World Records she ran for 18 hours a day while raising money for Leukaemia and Lymphoma Research and Zoe’s Place Baby Hospice.

Northern Echo columnist Mike Amos was invited to officiate at the finish of the event, and he will compile the evidence to submit to Guinness World Records to confirm the milestones.

After an unhappy childhood in Cambridge, Mrs Gayter moved to Eston, in east Cleveland, where she knew no one and got a job as a bus driver.

It was an attack by a group of youths while working on the buses that led her to take up competitive running.

She became a student at Teesside University, where she studied a sports science degree and masters.

Her inspirational story has been turned into an autobiography, The Clock Keeps Ticking, which can be bought from local book shops or at sharongayter.com Mrs Gayter, who is a part-time lecturer at the university, has competed in more than 1,000 races, including 300 marathons, and holds the world record for running from Land’s End to John O’Groats, which she achieved in 2006.

The athlete is now planning to run across Ireland in March, covering about 350 miles.

“My feet are a bit sore, but otherwise I feel fine,”

she said. “I’m now looking forward to having a good Christmas with a lovely week off.”