A brilliant opening leg from Caroline Hoyte in the National Road Relay Championships at Sutton Park, Birmingham, underlined her return to form.

Since coming back to racing after injury two months ago, Hoyte has made steady progress and is emulating her impressive performances of last year.

At Birmingham she finished third in 14min.28sec, the ninth fastest of the day.

But her Arena 80 team-mates failed to keep up the pace.

Former national 10km road race champion Lynn Williams, who has missed much of her training recently as she prepares to move to Watford, ran well but slipped to eighth place on the second leg.

Veterans Clare Aquilina and injured Chris Naylor completed the team, Aquilina dropping to 17th and Naylor to 23rd on the final leg.

Arena 80 were the lone Sussex club in the women's race and Phoenix the only one from the county to make the journey for the men's 6 x 5.1km race.

Injuries and absentees robbed Phoenix of any hope of matching their best placing, but reigning Sussex Schools cross country champion Darryl Hards made a steady start, finishing 36th out of 88.

Former Sussex 10,000m track champion Geoff Hill made up one place on the second leg and the in-form Tom Naylor lifted the team ten places at halfway.

Naylor, whose mother had anchored the Arena 80 women's team, clocked 18min.14sec, the fastest ran by a Phoenix athlete.

The Parkin twins, Ali and Tim, who had been drafted into the team, took the next two legs.

Ali slipped back to 34th and Tim gained one place on the fifth leg only for last-minute replacement Russell Pitman to bring the team home in 35th.