NOTHING that the phenomenal Brian Lara does with a bat in his hands can be ever regarded as unexpected. Yet he continues to amaze.

His latest feat of genius was to plunder 28 runs off the penultimate over from left-arm spinner Robin Peterson, the most in Test cricket history, at the end of a day on which his 23rd Test hundred kept alive the West Indies' hopes of salvation in the first Test yesterday.

The left-handed captain punched the inexperienced Peterson, playing his fourth Test through point for four off his first ball.

He stepped out to hoist the next two into the seats at long-on for sixes, lifted fours back overhead off the fourth and fifth and ended the over with a delicate cut boundary.

"I just played each ball on merit," Lara said matter-of-factly when asked if he had deliberately targeted Peterson to erase the follow-on requirement by stumps.

Of course, each ball's merit has a different meaning to Lara than to mere mortals.

The sudden fusilade carried the West Indies to within one run of avoiding the possibility of following-on to South Africa's mammoth 561, a run duly collected by Merv Dillon in the next, closing over.

It also surpassed the 26 by New Zealander Craig McMillan of Pakistan's Younis Khan in New Zealand three years ago that had been the previous record.

Lara ended 178 not out of the West Indies' 363 for six at stumps, still 198 in arrears with two days remaining. As he noted afterwards, there is still a lot of work to be done to ensure the series of four Tests does not start in defeat.

As usual, he was the team's standard bearer.

Of the 276 added by the West Indies from the day's 90 overs, Lara scored 178. Of the remaining 98, Shivnarine Chanderpaul contributed 34, Daren Ganga eeked out 11 more in two hours to add to the 49 he had at the start and Ridley Jacobs, Vasbert Drakes and Merv Dillon cobbled together 31 between them.

While seven fours were struck at the opposite end, Lara had 28 in addition to his sixes off Peterson, in six-and-a-quarter hours batting. The majority were savage cuts and drives through the off-side with the typical, full swing of the bat, but there were also flicks off the legs that again emphasised the strength of his wrists and the sharpness of his eyesight.

He accelerated as the day went on, 33 by lunch, the 77 to carry him to his 100 with a cut single off Pollock in the last over to tea and the other 78 in the last session.

He said he took the lead from watching on television in the morning India's fightback against Australia in a Test half a world away in Adelaide.

"Seeing (Rahul) Dravid and (VVS) Laxman (who added over 300) and the young wicket-keeper (Parthiv Patel) was the impetus that I needed to come out there today," he said.

"They were taking on Australia, the best team in the world, we were taking on the second best team in the world, South Africa, both had made in excess of 500 runs and I used some of their strengths in today's performance," he added.

It was not always easy for Lara on another day of roasting sunshine.

He had to withstand an intense examination of high quality fast bowling, especially from Makhaya Ntini, South Africa's best bowler with three for 72, and the fast and furious Andre Nel.

Nel troubled him most with his speed, hostility and accuracy if not with his snarling comments as he followed through to within a few yards of his face.

The key moment came when Lara, at 15, was missed by Shaun Pollock on a simple, lap-high catch at first slip off Ntini.

After that, Lara said he felt "comfortable". He certainly looked it. He was 62 when he cut Jacques Kallis so hard and wide to the unfortunate Peterson's right at point that only an acrobatic leap that got his fingers to the ball qualified it as a half-chance.

On his way to his first hundred in 12 Tests against South Africa, and his fifth in nine matches since his reinstatement as captain in March, Lara received sound, if almost static, support from Ganga and from fellow left-hander Chanderpaul.

He and Ganga came through a torrid first session. While Ganga was becalmed for the two hours, Lara was also hard-pressed to score after Ramnaresh Sarwan touched Shaun Pollock's perfect outswinger to the 'keeper 25 minutes into play.

Even if stationery, Ganga saw to it that there was no further wicket in a period when Ntini, Pollock and Nel pressed hardest for South Africa.

He had got through the roughest times only to waste the effort with an ill-advised pull off Makhaya Ntini to the third ball after lunch.

It lobbed to square-leg, a replica of his dismissal in the second innings of his debut in Durban on the tour five years ago, the soft ways he choose to get out continues to impede Ganga.

Chanderpaul stayed with Lara for the next two-and-three-quarter hours in a partnership worth 125. When his defensive backfoot shot to Ntini 55 minutes after tea rolled back onto off-stump and dislodged the bail, his contribution was 34.

Jacobs, such an annoyance to South Africa in the previous two series and, until yesterday, the only West Indian with a hundred against them, lasted 13 balls until he was Ntini's third wicket to a catch at the wicket from a delivery angled across him.

Drakes, sent in next to save the hobbled Chris Gayle for the morning, gathered 21 from 42 balls with three sweet off-driven fours off Peterson and, when he was lbw coming inside his stumps to Jacques Kallis, Dillon - "Gayle's nightwatchman" according to Lara - stayed with his captain to the end.

Lara warmed up for his pyrotechnics off Peterson with two boundaries of sheer perfection off Pollock - a whipped drive through mid-wicket and a full-blooded drive to through extra-cover.