The second was an Ashburton dairy farmer who in March took on the coldest and windiest ultra-marathon on the planet, pulling a sled 566km in temperatures as low as minus 40 degrees.
Greg Roadley became the first New Zealander to complete that race, the 6633 Arctic Ultra through Canada.
The third was another Kiwi out for a challenge who woke up one morning and decided to run across the South Island. Why? Because no one had done it.
Glenn Sutton covered almost 500km of hellish hills and moments of tears and agony to get the job done.
The reason I've been captivated by these stories is simple - it's called living life.
How many of us wonder what else is out there? There is a sporting challenge out there for all of us.
Sportspeople - greedy or just human?
Welcome to what might just be the greatest debating point in modern sport - athletes choosing cash over club and country.
It's not like the "good old days" when Sir Colin Meads played for free and his pre-match meal was steak and eggs.
Or when Black Caps opener Bruce Edgar faced up to that fearsome West Indian pace attack of the 1980s with some makeshift protection and a laundromat allowance.
That's right, a daily fee to keep their national whites sparkly and clean. That was it. Score a century, mend the bruises and back to work.
These days, sports stars are creating fortunes. Anthony Joshua, for example, is tipped to become Britain's billion-dollar boxer. The world's top 100 athletes earned more than US$3.5 billion last year.
So now we move into the next phase of this ongoing source of angst for sports fans worldwide - our heroes choosing money over values such as 'team' and 'legacy'.
Now it's the turn of Australia's top cricketers to use the player power card. Cricket Australia is facing a revolt - no surprise what it's over.
They've offered the likes of David Warner and Steve Smith substantial three-year deals worth millions but with one major clause - no Indian Premier League.
Warner's response? "Laughable." The world's top cricketers can pocket tens of millions if they sustain long-term IPL careers. Quite simply, as Warner pointed out, no T20 freedom, no deal.
Before you point the finger at Australia's cricketers for showing greed and disdain for the game that's made them rich and famous, remember New Zealand Cricket created a window so our top players were not robbed of IPL pay days. NZC had no choice - open the pathway, or risk losing players at much earlier stages of their international careers.
Even the toffee-nosed traditionalists at the England and Wales Cricket Board have allowed three of their leading stars to earn big in India instead of playing a one-day series at home against Ireland.
Sportspeople only receive obscene amounts because they generate obscene amounts.
As long as broadcasters up the ante in terms of television rights, threats of strikes and allegations of player power are just a by-product of pro sport.
You may call Australia's cricketers greedy. I call them human.
To burn or not to burn
I spend hours every week on my Facebook page trying to work out what talking points will fire you up. Last Sunday, I found one.
Or more specifically, one of my Facebookers Samantha did, when she sent through a video of her partner and his father setting their Warriors jerseys on fire after the loss at Penrith.
Around 6500 comments later on my page, Samantha pulled the video after some seriously abusive personal messages.
I get that it annoyed plenty of Warriors supporters and general sports fans.
But it's worth noting Samantha initially shared the video with me as a private message. I asked if she was comfortable posting to my main page, and she was.
I wasn't entirely sure about placing such an inflammatory video on a public page. I spoke with my boss and we agreed it was destined to get a reaction but it was also representative of a couple of fans expressing their frustration with the exasperating Warriors.
Despite the hate-filled messages, Samantha says she does not regret posting the video, "as it was sending a strong message to the team, showing what they are doing to their fans".
But it's another warning to us all - think long and hard before posting anything to social media.
