Rome, Aug 2 (DPA) When Serbian 50m butterfly winner Milorad Cavic tried to rattle Michael Phelps' cage ahead of Saturday evening's 100m butterfly final, the American superstar simply said he would let his swimming do the talking.

And Phelps was loud and clear.

Lying only fourth at the first turn with 23.36, Phelps was 0.67 seconds behind Cavic, but in the end he was 0.13 seconds ahead, having won in world record time of 49.82.

Seconds after touching for his victory, Phelps exploded in a way in which he had never done so before.

He jumped on the line markings that separated him from the beaten challenger and screamed, a finger outstretched towards the sky. He then pointed towards his bodysuit, a Speedo LZR Racer.

Cavic had earlier in the week offered to buy Phelps an all-polyurethane suit, but as he pointed out after the race, he clearly did not need one.

Then he swam over the markings, ignoring Cavic and congratulated Spain's Rafael Munoz, who had taken the bronze.

In Beijing, Phelps had beaten Cavic in the final of the same event by the length of a fingernail and Cavic still maintains that he was the real winner and that the timing simply did not work correctly.

This time it was much clearer, even though Phelps thought that it would again go down to the wire.

He said before the race that he could afford to be behind Cavic at the turn, but not by more than a second. 'I felt so good coming off the wall. My kick off the wall felt really, really good.

'I saw the splash out of my left eye from his lane coming over, and I saw him getting closer and closer, and I heard the crowd getting louder and louder. I figured it was going to come down to the touch again.'

During the medal presentation, Phelps again showed that this must have been one of the most important victories of his career, as he was visibly eager to mount the podium.