Michael Phelps gives a finger wag after winning the 200m butterfy. (Getty)
On Tuesday night, Michael Phelps and Chad le Clos faced off in the Men’s 200m Butterfly final, after a tense semi on Monday night. The race turned out to be incredibly exciting with Phelps winning gold and le Clos on the outside looking in. After it, Phelps did a Dikembe Mutombo impression, wagging his finger at his opponents. Considering that this was Phelps’ 20th Olympic gold medal, he more than deserved to do that and proved that he still dominates the sport.
The win meant that Phelps took back the gold medal from South Africa’s Chad le Clos, who barely beat Phelps in London. The London race was the very definition of epic. Le Clos won by just five-hundredths of a second with a time of 1:52.96. Phelps’ time was 1:53.01. You can watch the full race here.
The race in Rio was just as exciting, with an even smaller margin of victory. Phelps came out ahead of Japan’s Masato Sakai by just four-hundredths of a second. The other swimmers who won medals weren’t the men who were expected to. Both Hungary’s László Cseh and Le Clos failed to even medal in the race.
Gold: Michael Phelps (1:53.36)
Silver: Masato Sakai (1:53.40)
Bronze: Tamás Kenderesi (1:53.62)
Phelps’ celebration of the win will quickly remind sports fans of Mutombo’s famous finger wag:
This was Phelps’ 20th gold medal and 24th Olympic medal overall. Later on Tuesday, he won his 21st gold and 25th overall in the Men’s 4x200m freestyle relay.
