Everyone knew Maggie Vessey.

On a track at Monta Vista High in 1997, Vessey, in her freshman year, burst onto the California track scene by taking third in the 400 meters at the Central Coast Section championships.

"She was -- not a legend -- but everybody knew what a great talent she had," says Bill Johnson, who watched her at the section meet that year while coaching sprinters at Soquel High. "She had that beautiful running style that she still has. You saw her and said, Oh my god. She's really something.'

"And then she didn't run as a sophomore," Johnson says.

Why would someone so obviously predestined for greatness would let the fields lie fallow for a year?