TV quizzer Mark “The Beast” Labbett says he’s “too busy for a relationship” after splitting from wife Katie.
The star and Katie confirmed their separation in 2020 after spending seven years wed — blaming their 27-year age gap and life in the Covid-19 lockdown for their troubles.
Mark, one of the six brainbox “Chasers” on ITV’s The Chase, hosted by Bradley Walsh, moved out of the couple’s Herefordshire home.
He set up a bachelor pad for himself closer to London and has no intention of sharing it for the time being.
“I’m too busy for a relationship,” he told The Celeb Report in an exclusive chat.
Mark is not short on offers from the opposite sex though, with female fans getting so aggressive with their interest in him that he had to hire a personal guard.
Mark makes public appearances up and down the country and hired a minder after revealing he is regularly sexually assaulted at gigs.
But the 6ft 6in TV “chaser” said: “I can safely say on any given gig I get my a**e felt up to four times.
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“Every gig I get sexually assaulted.
“The worst one, I was wearing jeans and the woman grabbed my meat and two veg through them.
“If I’d have done that to her I’d be in the cells.
“I felt violated.
“I’ve got a guy I work with now and he keeps an eye for me and will detect when something like that is going to happen.”
“I do a lot of student gigs and I get the young ladies who are only 19 or 20, I say, ‘love, leave me alone’.”
Mark decided to leave his wife so she could move on with her lover, Scott, after their open marriage failed.
Nurse Kate, 29, and Mark cited his workload and worldwide travel as triggers behind their split.
However, Mark admits his wife’s ongoing relationship with Scott has taken its toll despite the couple’s initial attempts to have an open marriage.
The star first met Katie, his second cousin, via Facebook in 2010.
She said: “I had never heard of Mark, or watched The Chase, but my gran mentioned him so I was intrigued.”
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They got together in 2012, going for drinks on their first date after Mark, who boasts an IQ of 151 — “genius is 150”, he adds modestly — invited her to watch a celebrity Chase special.
They got engaged in October the next year and share a five-year-old son.
