Swimming at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Men's 100 metre freestyle
Final
Table:
Rank
Lane
Name
Nationality
Time
Notes

5
Pieter van den Hoogenband
Netherlands
48.17

4
Roland Mark Schoeman
South Africa
48.23

8
Ian Thorpe
Australia
48.56

4
1
Ryk Neethling
South Africa
48.63

5
3
Filippo Magnini
Italy
48.99

6
7
Duje Draganja
Croatia
49.23

7
2
Salim Iles
Algeria
49.30

6
Andrey Kapralov
Russia

According to the following table labelled Swimming at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Men's 100 metre freestyle — section "Final", provide an answer in a short sentence to the question below: How did Ian Thorpe perform compared to Ryk Neethling in the 2004 Summer Olympics Men's 100 metre freestyle? Provide just your answer in a JSON object {"answer": "YOUR ANSWER"}.

answer: Australia's Ian Thorpe edged out Ryk Neethling with 48.56 and clinched a bronze medal by 0.07 of a second.