Big Picture: Channel Hopper

Last July, Jim Bayles '74 suited up in a Speedo, cap and goggles and started swim- ming the English Channel just south of the famed white cliffs of Dover (back- ground). Ten hours and 59 minutes later the 50-year-old former Dartmouth freestyler emerged at Cape Gris-Nez on the French coast, making him the third- fastest channel swimmer over the age of 50. "I counted my strokes to stay efficient," he says. (Well, almost: Bayles counted in increments of 105 to pace himself; he cal- culates it took 42,000 strokes to reach France.) The Connecticut resident crossed the 25-mile channel to raise money for the Epilepsy Foundation of Connecticut— and to experience his dream swim. "The channel is the ultimate," he says.