TWO men from Swindon braved the cold to smash the world record for the most naked riders on a rollercoaster.

Gareth Davies and Martin Peapell were joined at Blackpool Pleasure Beach by 193 fellow naturists, who were attempting to beat the previous mark of 102 – set in Southend in 2010.

The clothes-free ride on the famous Grand National attraction saw Stratton 31-year-old Gareth combine two of his pastimes in a mission to write his name into the Guinness Book of World Records.

“I’ve been to nudist beaches so I’m not one to be shy and I knew in a society like that, everybody is used to being around naked people,” said Gareth.

“So, it was actually really free and nice because nobody judges.

“It’s an unusual place to do it. There were a lot of rollercoaster enthusiasts and then there were the naturists, and it was really nice to see these two very different societies joined together.

“It was incredibly cold and by the time we got on the ride it was raining. The weather was changing throughout the day and we were wondering whether people were going to turn up.

“But there were so many people that we were queuing outside the building to go in.”

Gareth and Martin, a 49-year-old from Shrivenham, were joined by men and women aged from 18 to 70.

“Naturism has always been very controversial for the fact that these days and age everybody wears clothes and obviously everything is sexualised, but it’s not about that – even the young people were with their families and it’s just a way of life,” said Gareth.

“On the beach it’s just to get a tan or go swimming, there’s nothing sexual at all. It’s just to be free and not to be restricted.”

Gareth added that similar events would help to normalise and spread the practice across country.

He said: “The more people expose things like this, the more it becomes normalised, I suppose.

“And if you think that nine years ago they had 102 people and we got 195 people, I think it just shows that it becomes more acceptable.

“People realised that it’s nothing, it’s just people being themselves. “

British Naturism is still waiting for the official confirmation of their record from Guinness.

“They will spend the next few weeks checking all the names and videos to make sure everything was conformed to, and then the actual record will be fully announced in about six to eight weeks,” said Gareth.