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The top five bare-handed animal kills (with the occasional use of makeshift weaponry)

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A 35-year-old man from Recife, Brazil, killed a shark with his bare hands on Saturday. Fact.

Diving instructor Davi Montaga Ruiz was preparing for a solo dive when a shark bit his leg. Ruiz broke the shark's jaw by pulling it apart and eventually killed it by hitting it with a rock. Read that again.

Davi was lucky because he was in shallow water when the shark attacked. "If I'd been further out I'd have been dead," he said. "I didn't even see him coming, I was getting ready for my dive then, wham."

Davi's tale of mantastic-ness (mantasticity?) got us thinking. We wanted to know, what the best barehanded kills of all time are. We decided we'd allow people in if they killed the beats using just their hands, or a blunt implement found nearby. No weapons as we know them.

So we packed our bags, kissed our mums' on the cheek and set sail on the Internet to find out who made the grade. In retrospect it was a bit melodramatic -- we didn't leave the house...

Animal: Lion
Man: Tepilit Ole Saitot
Why? Maasai man kills lion in tradition to prove manhood .
How? The Maasai tradition usually involves a group of young men of the tribe having to overpower the king of the jungle. But in this case from 1948 Tepilit was alone. Oh right yeah and he'd been camping and fasting on his own for three days. Got that? He literally killed a lion, on an empty stomach. And the Maasai policy on weapons goes something like this: "No weapons". Old Ole wasn't even hunting when he killed the lion, an adult female. Nope, the cheeky lion attacked him while he was sleeping. Ole killed the beast by stunning it with a kick then hitting his head into a rocky buttress. Poor lion.
As tough as? The olden days.

Animal: Black bear
Man: Chris Everhart
Why? The bear was about to attack his son.
How? Ex-Marine Chris was out camping with his three sons when a black bear smelt their cooler box. Chris' son Logan wasn't happy seeing a bear noshing into his grub and waved a spade to scare him off. It didn't work. The bear rounded on Logan and was storming toward him when Chris grabbed a log and chucked it at the bear, hitting him square on the bonce. Initially Chris thought he'd just knocked the bear out but it turned out to be dead. "I feel bad about killing the bear," said Chris. Nice guy.
As tough as? Well, an Ex-Marine.

Animal: Shark
Man: Sigurdur "The Iceman" Petursson -- an Icelandic trawler captain
Why? The 660 pounder was heading for his crew as they worked in shallow water.
How? The captain, known as "The Iceman", saw the shark heading toward his crew before jumping into the water distracting the big fish. As it moved closer to him, he shimmied alongside grabbing it behind its fins. He then pulled the thing ashore where he killed it with a knife. Granted that's a weapon but we figure the beast was in his element now. He could have let it suffocate but this was a mercy killing. A member of his crew said, "that's just what he's like. He didn't even want his picture taken with it."
As tough as? Mike Tyson's nightmares.

Animal: Leopard
Man: 73-year-old Daniel M'Mburugu
Why? It attacked him. Fair enough.
How? Ready yourself, because this one is weird: Daniel, who was holding a machete when he first noticed the leopard, told The Standard Newspaper: "God told me to drop the machete [you sure God?] and to thrust my hand into its wide mouth." He then ripped out the cougar's tongue out causing its wind pipe to collapse. "I noticed the breathing become belaboured and eventually stop," said the suprisingly eloquent peasant farmer. Officials suggested that the animal attacked because it was already injured and wouldn't have set upon Daniel had it been healthy.
As tough as? God?

Animal: Bobcat
Man: Dale Rippey
Why? It attacked him while he was hanging out his washing. No-one gets between a Vietnam vet and his washing.
How? Dale, who lives on the edge of a nature conservation area, noticed a bobcat crawling out for the undergrowth one morning. Initially he mistook the cat for a domestic cat, before realising he was in trouble. As the cat made for him Dale was ready to take a mauling. He caught the aggressive kitty round the neck and managed to throttle it as it scratched. Despite the animal's relatively small stature Dale stuck to the bare-hands mantra better than anyone else on our list -- so good on him.
As tough as? A Vietnam vet.