Caroline Hoyte claimed an unprecedented sixth Sussex Cross Country Championship title and then admitted: “I’m not very good at running off road”.

Hoyte climbed off her sickbed to defend her crown at a frosty Stanmer Park on Saturday by the biggest margin in the 44-year history of the event.

The national 10k champion and Great Britain international road runner showed her class as she finished a massive 2min.19sec ahead of Arena 80 club-mate Gemma Sharp.

The victory came 12 years after the 38-year-old first tasted success at the championships and she has now chalked up two more titles than the four Penny Yule achieved between 1965 and 1973.

Hoyte is now targetting a place at the World Cross Country Championships in Jordan in March but admits her chances of qualifying are slim.

She said: “It was nice to win again, especially as I had been ill with flu for two weeks and only made the decision to run on the morning of the race.

“To win six titles is great but I’m looking forward to getting back on the road because cross country is certainly not my forte.

“I really enjoy the mud and would love to be good at it but for some reason I am just not very good at it. I find it really frustrating as people I would expect to beat on the road seem to get the better of me over the country.

“It would be a dream to make the World Championships so I am going to give it a go at the trials and you never know what might happen.”

Hoyte hammered home her dominance by taking the lead right from the start and gradually pulling further clear over the 6.5km course to win in 26min.6sec with Sharp just pipping Gill Wheeler to second place.

She also combined with Sharp, Emma Rollings and Chris Naylor as Arena 80 won the team title ahead of Hailsham Harriers and Horsham Blue Star.

Olly Freeman praised the sportsmanship of closest rival Ben Warren after he completed a hat-trick of wins in the men’s race.

The Bodyworks star had started to pull away from Warren on the opening lap when he took a wrong turn only for the Hailsham Harrier to call him back.

Freeman, a professional triathlete, went on to finish 21 seconds ahead of Warren as he crossed the line in 41min.34sec for the 12km course with Tom Naylor a distant third.

Freeman, who turns 22 on Sunday, said: “I had only run once at Stanmer Park before and that was a while ago in the English Schools Championships. The course was completely different too so I didn’t really know where I was going.

“It was really good of Ben to tell me I was going the wrong way and we joked afterwards that he might have won if he had kept quiet.

“Winning my third title in a row is a great way to start 2009 and hopefully I can push on now. It is a big year for me after climbing to sixth in the world rankings in 2008 and my aim is to build on that.”

Keith Newton came fourth to lead the Brighton and Hove City team of Andrew Donno, James Tomlinson, Luke Lambourne, Chris Thomson and Josh Painter to victory ahead of Crawley and Phoenix.

Adam Clarke and Caitlin Lloyd were convincing winners of the under-20 races. Clarke finished 42 seconds clear of Jack Swallow with Matt Basford a further minute back in third while Lloyd beat pre-race favourite Sarah Wigmore by 46 seconds.