Various sports require various degrees of toughness. Wellington hooker Norm Hewitt played in in the 2000 Air NZ Cup final against Canterbury with a broken arm. Bert Sutcliffe played a brave hand for New Zealand against South Africa at Ellis Park in 1953 after suffering a sickening blow to the head. And Buck Shelford played on against France in 1986 at Nantes with his scrotum torn open, and a testicle hanging out.
But this one is right up there; Stuff reports:
The Tour de France is gruelling enough, with its punishing mountain climbs and brutal descents in a three-week pursuit of the feted yellow jersey.
But how about tackling all of that with a fractured pelvis?
That's the agonising situation Welshman and Sky team member Geraint Thomas finds himself in, following a spectacular crash near the finishing line during the opening stage of cycling's most prestigious event.
Thomas, a dual Olympic track cycling gold medallist, went over his bars and landed on his back on the narrow roads leading into Bastia, after the Australian team's Orica GreenEdge bus became lodged under a banner at the finishing line.
With riders bearing down, race organisers temporarily moved the finishing line back three kilometres before restoring the route once the bus was removed. There were several pile-ups amid the confusion.
Thomas, 27, underwent scans on Saturday night and was cleared to ride the following day.
He climbed back into the saddle, only to endure what he described as "one of the worst days I've ever had on a bike", finishing 17 minutes and 35 seconds down on the leaders.
A further MRI scan on Sunday night revealed a small fracture to his pelvis.
But, in what sounds like a mind-boggling decision to most people, Thomas has vowed to battle on through the epic endurance event with a fractured pelvis.
On Monday, he needed help to lift his leg over his bike's crossbar before the start.
Even his mother thinks he's mad.
"I'm going to continue, to give it a good go even if my mum doesn't want me to," Thomas said following stage three of the Tour.
"I have not come here just to do a lap of France.
"I've done so much to lose weight and get fit for this.
"I'm not going to give up straight away.
"The experts have said I am not going to do any more damage by riding. It is just a matter of if it improves."
James Heathers, an applied physiologist at the University of Sydney, said Thomas' vow to battle on exemplified the single-mindedness of world class athletes compared to everyone else.
"It's very difficult for 'normal' people who don't have that mindset to understand how impossibly competitive and single-minded you have to be to succeed at something like this," Mr Heathers said.
He said he did not know the extent of Thomas' injury, and it was possible that "it may sound worse than it is". But world-class athletes were extremely driven.
We're with Geraint Thomas' mother; he IS mad. But he is also one tough rooster. Surely there couldn't be a sport that was less friendly to someone with a fractured pelvis than road cycling.
Thomas may not complete the Tour de France. But he deserves a medal for even trying, when anyone with less resolve would simply walk away.
