EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Paul McCartney’s ex-wife Heather Mills sets a new world ski record

Some claimed that Heather Mills was on a slippery slope when she divorced Sir Paul McCartney in 2008, but the former model has proved that going downhill fast can be exhilarating.

Two years after their divorce, Mills took up competitive skiing and she’s just entered the book of Guinness World Records, as the fastest disabled female skier of all time, having been clocked doing an incredible 102mph in Vars, France, in 2015.

Amputee Mills, 55, says: ‘I’m delighted to have finally made it into the book.’

She wore a specially designed prosthetic leg to withstand the stresses on the course.

Two years after their divorce, Mills took up competitive skiing and she’s just entered the book of Guinness World Records, as the fastest disabled female skier of all time, having been clocked doing an incredible 102mph in Vars, France, in 2015

Some claimed that Heather Mills was on a slippery slope when she divorced Sir Paul McCartney in 2008, but the former model has proved that going downhill fast can be exhilarating

Newlywed TV star Zane splits from artist Nettie 

Having courted women including The Voice presenter Emma Willis, Girls Aloud’s late singer Sarah Harding and actress Sadie Frost, TV presenter Alex Zane finally settled down last summer with trendy artist Nettie Wakefield.

I hear that the couple have, however, already split up, scarcely five months after their London wedding celebrations.

‘At the end of last year we decided to separate,’ confirms Zane, 43, who proposed to Nettie, 35, in 2018. ‘We leave each other in the best way possible for two people who have shared incredible experiences, full of love and laughter and as many happy memories as two people can make in that time.

‘We remain best friends despite making the decision to go our separate ways.’

TV presenter Alex Zane finally settled down last summer with trendy artist Nettie Wakefield. I hear that the couple have, however, already split up, scarcely five months after their London wedding celebrations

The Yorkshireman adds: ‘Obviously, leaving behind a relationship is never easy, but we move forward knowing we have the other to rely on. It’s as amicable a separation as can be and, of course, we’ll continue to co-parent our whippet, Simon.’

I’m told that Nettie, who was previously squired by Poldark heart-throb Aidan Turner and was linked to Twilight star Robert Pattinson, is being comforted by model Owen McGinnity, who was pictured with his arm round her last October.

Nettie, whose artworks hang in the Groucho Club, exchanged vows with Zane during the pandemic, but they were forced to limit their number of wedding guests because of Covid restrictions, so had the big celebration last August.

Zane made his name on Channel 4 as co-presenter of Popworld with Alexa Chung and the clip show Rude Tube.

After he proposed to Nettie, a source was reported as saying: ‘He’s completely smitten and soon realised he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.’

May’s steamy knight out with Anita 

Queen guitarist Sir Brian May and his wife, the former EastEnders star Anita Dobson, looked like they were members of the cast when they turned up to watch Cirque Du Soleil’s latest show, Kurious, at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

The circus spectacular has the theme of ‘Steampunk’ — a science fiction genre inspired by 19th-century industrial steam-powered machinery.

And the rocker, 75, and Dobson, 73, arrived in fancy costumes in keeping with the evening’s theme. ‘We were already into steampunk so we thought we would go for it,’ Sir Brian tells me.

Queen guitarist Sir Brian May and his wife, the former EastEnders star Anita Dobson, looked like they were members of the cast when they turned up to watch Cirque Du Soleil’s latest show, Kurious, at the Royal Albert Hall in London

Adams conversion is snookered — by bats

Strictly Come Dancing star Tony Adams has cancelled his plans for a stables conversion at his £3.5million Cotswolds mansion after bats were f o u n d l i v i n g i n the roof. 

The England and Arsenal legend, 56, and his wife, Poppy Teacher, wanted to turn the outbuilding into a two-bedroom annexe, but a bat survey found the snooker room is being used as a night roost for lesser horseshoe, serotine and brown long-eared bats — a protected species. 

Given that he’s been almost killed at least twice in car crashes, you’d think Richard ‘Hamster’ Hammond’s family might want him to give up driving. Instead, the Grand Tour presenter, 53, says they want to put the brakes on his jiving. ‘My wife and daughters have banned me from dancing because of my dancing face,’ Hammond admits. ‘The dad moves are bad enough, but when topped by a stupid, grinning, dancing-dad face, it’s unforgivable. At weddings I’m told to sit down.’

Oscar winner Jeremy Irons, who’s played some of cinema’s most villainous baddies, has set his sights on a much more light-hearted role. ‘I want to play a clown, as I think some of my behaviour in life shows I’m still a bit of a clown,’ he tells me at a theatre show in London.

Of his role as Scar, the evil antagonist in Disney’s The Lion King, Irons, 74, admits his distinct voice still terrifies children he meets. ‘Sometimes they run away from me in horror because they hear my voice. Of course, I love children, but when they’re running away.’

Harry kicks lapdog 

Omid Scobie is the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s most loyal lapdog, but Harry has given him a sharp kick in his memoirs nevertheless.

Though refraining from naming him, Harry focuses his sights on Scobie’s biography, Finding Freedom, in which it is alleged that Meghan underwent unsparing kidnap training.

‘A best-selling book describes the day Special Forces came to our house, grabbed Meg, put her through several intense days of drills, pushing her into back seats and car boots, speeding away to safe houses,’ Harry writes.

Indeed, Scobie’s account claims: ‘Meghan was even taught to develop a relationship with the enemy [and] instructed on how to drive a car while in pursuit.’

The whole experience was ‘extremely intense and scary’ for Meghan, who, Scobie writes, was subjected to it before her wedding — unlike Kate Middleton.

According to Harry, this is all ‘utter nonsense’. Meghan ‘wasn’t given one minute of training’, he adds. ‘On the contrary, the Palace floated the idea of not giving her any security at all because I was now sixth in line to the throne.’

He a Household Cavalry officer, but You’re Beautiful singer James Blunt admits that, at 5ft 6in, he failed to be a convincing Superman at a fancy-dress bash. ‘I was walking home from the party with my wife,’ he says of aristocrat Sofia Wellesley. ‘She was dressed as Wonder Woman — and I was four inches shorter than her in her heels. I just looked like a little child being led home in my outfit.’