FACES IN THE CROWD

Jim Edwards, a Williston Academy (Mass.) senior, broke the national prep record for the 100-yard freestyle with a time of 48.4 in a meet with Deerfield Academy. A week later in a meet against Dartmouth freshmen he re-broke that record. His time: 48 seconds.

Adrian Watt, 17, outdistanced Olympic Ski Jumpers Niilo Halonen of Finland and Gene Kotlarek of Duluth and matched Olympian Dave Hicks to set a distance record of 244 feet on the Duluth Ski Club's 70-meter hill. Watt's combined totals were the day's best.

Gay Maher, Medford, N.J. flight instructor and mother of three, made the first solo helicopter flight by a woman across the U.S. She delivered a new copter from a plant in California to a purchaser in New Jersey after an 11-day trip that covered some 3,000 miles.

Bob Hetherington, a 23-year-old divinity student from Harvard and ninth-ranked amateur squash player in the U.S., upset Charles Ufford of New York, third-ranked nationally, in straight sets 15-14, 15-10 and 15-6 to win the Canadian amateur championship.

Larry Mikan, 6-foot-4 center for Minneapolis' Benilde High, scored eight points in his team's 16th win in 17 games. His father. George, who once scored 63 points for the Lakers but never played in high school, said, "He's way ahead of me at this stage."

Tom Hoover, 23, a garage mechanic from Minneapolis, won the Top Fuel Eliminator Championship at the Winternational Drag Races in Scottsdale, Ariz. In a dragster with a 392-cubic-inch supercharged Chrysler engine he took the quarter-mile final in 7.75.

SIX PHOTOS