Looking at the height of soldiers from WW1, there would have also been very substantial gains in players’ heights, with better nutrition and the effects of migration perhaps the causal factors.

The increase in weight/ size of the players is just part in parcel of the game going professional. I doubt we will see similar increases over the next ten years.

The increase in weight/ size of the players is just part in parcel of the game going professional.

I hope Banahan is still playing come the Six Nations – the 5’6 Shane Williams will run rings around him.

It must be.

The tester pinches the skin at a site such as the side of the abdomen and pulls the fold of skin away from the underlying muscle so only the skin and fat tissue is being held. Calipers are then used to measure the skinfold thickness. Typically measurements are taken at a number of positions on the body and these are then entered into an equation which gives a skinfold number or ranking.

It is a useful and convenient form of measurement, particularly for athletes who may have a large density of muscle in their body composition. Simply comparing their body weight to their height may suggest that they are unfit, as in the case of the English front rowers who I would suggest would be much fitter and have a lower proportion of body fat than their predecessors from the amateur era.

The problem is though its the bigger stick theory. As one team gets larger the others feel they must get larger and the cycle goes on until one day everyone playing is 150 kg !! Maybe they should have a body weight cap?

I remember campo in his biography mentioning that between one world cup to the next he had put on 10kg because the trainers told him to, but he felt that it slowed him down. So sometimes size isnt everything !!

No doubt we have seen the professional era allow players to train to be bigger. I thought the English front row had been on the Beer and Kebab diet. They were huge men and did not have the same involvements of the aust front row in general play. Basic physics will tell you that the bigger-faster stronger guy will always win the contact. There is a place for the smaller agile guys, but power to weight and ability to survive the contact component of the game is something i see as the key element still moving forward. You will find Johnny Wilkonson defines my thoughts. Yes he is smaller at 88kg. But is one of the most gifted athletes in world rugby i am led to believe.

A decade or so ago an 85 kg halfback would certainly not have been regarded as small.

You correctly state that rugby “is still a game for all the bodies types.’ I have often heard your fellow journo, Peter Fitzsimons, express the same sentiments as “rugby is a sport that caters for all shapes and sizes.” Easy to say when you are 195 cm with a playing weight around 120 kg.

Craig, I agree with you that “there was no way the english front row had low skin folds.” But I would bet that 18 years they would have weighed at least 10 kg less but would have required over-size calipers to measure their skinfolds.

England’s David Haye beat the Russian Goliath giant, Valuev, in Germany this evening, to take the WBA World Heavyweight title.

Unfortunately I don’t think this happens to often, especially amongst the forwards.

Or, just maybe the piggies are supposed to be carrying a few % more fat? It seems the old fashioned way was more effective…