HOLMDEL - Tom Yersak knew what to expect.

Running in his third Meet of Champions race yesterday, the Cherokee High School senior knew the race would go out fast. He also knew that for him to finish in the top 10, he would have to get out with the leaders, run a strong middle mile and hold off fatigue during the last half-mile.

In addition to his knowledge of the race, Yersak also entered yesterday's race with a great deal of confidence after running 16:22 last week to place third in the Group 4 state meet.

With a strategy in mind, along with a confident attitude, Yersak came up with his best performance of the season in the biggest race of the year as he dropped nine seconds off his time from last week to place 10th in the M of C. With a steady rain falling the entire race, Yersak covered the tough 3.1-mile course at Holmdel Park in 16:13, the fastest time by a South Jersey runner. It's the eighth consecutive year a county runner has been in the top 10.

"I'm very happy with the way I ran," Yersak said. "I don't think it could have gone any better. It was a great cap-off to the season."

Yersak sat in the top 10 as he went through the first mile in 5:18, which was about 20 seconds faster than last week's Group 4 race. In his mind, it was exactly how he thought the race would unfold.

"I was expecting it to go out hard," Yersak said. "I can handle the fast pace at the beginning of the race, so I really didn't think about it too much."

By the two-mile mark, just after the bowl, Yersak made his way up to third, but he began to fade a bit. As he rounded the tennis courts and completed the final downhill section, he hung tough to post his Holmdel PR.

"I kind of fell off the pace after the tennis courts," Yersak said. "The front guys picked up the pace and I didn't have much left to go with them.''

Bobby Papazian of Gill St. Bernard's won the individual title in 15:39 over Craig Forys (15:53) of Colts Neck and Hillsborough's Brian Dennis (16:03). Papazian's time ranks seventh all time at Holmdel. . . .

With Yersak finishing as the team's No. 1 runner, Cherokee scored 149 points to place fifth for the second year in a row. . . .

Behind Yersak, Cherokee's top five consisted of Greg Bredeck (22nd, 16:26), Vinny Marziano (63rd, 16:55), Sean McLaughlin (76th, 17:04) and James Maneval (81st, 17:09).

"I have to give the guys a lot of credit," Chiefs coach Steve Shaklee said. "They didn't give in today, and although we came in fifth, we were only nine points away from third.''

"I didn't have the feeling they didn't put the effort in. We've just had too many setbacks this season and we weren't the team we could have been."