Flanagan brings her track sense back to Boston

BOSTON (AP) _ Shalane Flanagan finally has two good feet to go along with something that never needed fixing. <br/><br/>``In Indiana, basketball's big and they call it 'ball sense.' It's

Friday, January 26th 2007, 2:12 pm

By: News On 6

BOSTON (AP) _ Shalane Flanagan finally has two good feet to go along with something that never needed fixing.

``In Indiana, basketball's big and they call it 'ball sense.' It's knowing where to be and what to do,'' said her mother, Cheryl Treworgy, a former world record holder in the marathon. ``That's the way she is with running. You never really had to tell her what to do.''

A 2004 Olympian at 5,000 meters, Flanagan knows where she'll be on Saturday: at the Boston Indoor Games at the Reggie Lewis Track & Athletic Center. The European-style pro meet features a fast track that saw 11 men break the four-minute mark in the mile _ the most in any indoor meet, anywhere in the world.

For Flanagan, the Boston Indoors is a chance to run near home; she grew up on the North Shore in Marblehead and was a Massachusetts state champion at the mile and two miles. At North Carolina, she won three NCAA titles _ including a cross country title in 2002 that was the school's first.

But it wasn't until after the 2005 world championships that Flanagan was running pain-free. Although doctors had scheduled her for surgery on what they thought was a damaged tendon, a last-minute X-ray before the operation revealed that she had been born with an extra bone in her left foot.

``I was literally going under when they told me about the new diagnosis,'' she said.

Flanagan was off the track from the Helsinki worlds in August 2005 until winning the Manchester Road Race in Manchester, Conn., last November.

``It's been way too long,'' she said.

Impatience has been a hallmark of Flanagan's running career, dating back to a childhood spent watching her parents go off for a jog.

``It was like, 'When's my turn?''' her mother said. ``She bugged us a lot about it.''

Flanagan's father, Steve, ran at the University of Connecticut and her mother, Cheryl Bridges, held the world record in the marathon (2:49:40) from 1971-73. Flanagan's mother was on five world cross country teams, and having her daughter make it to worlds was a chance for a new experience.

``When she made it, I said, 'I want to go watch,''' Treworgy said.

Despite coming from a family of runners, Flanagan was never pressured to compete. When her daughter sought coaching, Treworgy reminded her that the coach won't be able to run the race with her.

``We kept saying, 'Just have fun,' Treworgy said.

Also in the field this year are Alan Webb, who broke Jim Ryun's 36-year-old schoolboy record for the outdoor mile. Webb ran a personal best indoor mile at the New Balance Games in New York earlier this month.

Meseret Defar of Ethiopia, the world record holder and Olympic champion at 5,000 meters, returns for another try at a world record two years after coming within one second of breaking the 3,000 indoor mark.

Rising star Jenn Stuczynski will go after Stacy Dragila's American indoor record in the pole vault.