American superfish Michael Phelps removed a major obstacle on his way to an unprecedented feat of eight golds at a single Olympics by winning the men's 100 meter butterfly on Saturday.

Phelps touched the wall with an Olympic record of 50.58 seconds, overtaking Serbian Milorad Cavic, the runner-up, by 0.01 seconds. Australian Andrew Lauterstein got the bronze in 51.12

Phelps took off from lane five after qualifying second fastest in the heats. He was about half a body length behind Cavic in the first lap, and was the seventh to touch wall in the first 50 meters.

He lunged ahead in the last 50 to snag his seventh gold medal at the Beijing Games.

World record holder Ian Crocker finished the fourth in 51.13 seconds.

(Xinhua News Agency Agusut 16, 2008)