Crawley's Gavin Thompson collected an impressive victory in the Mid America Conference cross-country championships at Oxford, Ohio.

The win came after his East Michigan team-mate Boaz Cheboiywo took a wrong turn.

Chedoiywo made the error when 100m clear of the field and eventually came home in 16th place.

Thompson, who made the early pace with his team-mate, was too far adrift to call Cheboiywo back and he romped away with a fine victory. Thompson clocked 23min. 50.2sec for the 8km course.

It is not known whether Thompson will return home at Christmas to attempt to regain the Sussex cross-country crown he won previously.

Reigning Sussex champion Stephen Rees-Jones, who led the Brighton & Hove team to victory in Stanmer Park last January, made a good start to his cross-country season when he finished 17th in the Reebok Cross Challenge at Sennelys Park, Birmingham.

With his time of 35min. 31sec for the 12km course, Rees-Jones is in the kind of form that only a runner of the calibre of Thompson could match to deprive him of the title.

In the women's race, the Phoenix Club's Emma Satterley came 30th in the 6km race in 24min. 51sec.

Following their third spot in the Priory relays at Reigate the previous weekend, Crawley Athletic Club grabbed third in the South of the Thames Junior five-mile cross-country championships at West Wickham.

The junior relates to ability rather than age and, although not matching the class of 20 years ago, is still a tough race for younger athletes entering the senior age group and for the club standard runners.

It fell to veterans Rob Creed and county 3,000m champion Dave Rayner to lead the Crawley challenge as they came 12th and 13th while Mark Parry was 19th and Joel Clewett 22nd as the quartet achieved the highest team placing in this event since Brighton & Hove took the title in 1999. Clewett also filled fourth place in the under-20 competition.

The Crawley club also took third place in the team competition for eight scoring runners. Sam Webb from Crawley led the under-20s to a splendid fourth place.

However, Brighton & Hove City took the team honours, with Judith Bateman, Katie Sherwood, Jennie Williams and Rachael Vaughan filling the next four places, behind Webb, for the title.