Women's rugby is a team sport which raising interest enabled its recent professionalisation. In this sport, it has been shown that performances in male players depended on their body composition. However, only a few studies analysed female players. The aim of this study is to determine and compare body composition as well as anthropometric variables in the players of the French Women's XV's and VII's Team. Materials and methods Body composition of 53 professional rugby players from the French national women's XV's team (17 forwards and 12 backs) and VII's team (10 forwards and 14 backs) was measured using DEXA (Dual-Energy X-ray Absorptiometry). This data was collected at the start of the 2019-2020 season. The retained variables were age (years), height (cm), weight (kgs), body mass index (BMI) (kg.m-2), body fat percentage (BF %) ( %), bone mineral content (BMC) (g), fat mass (FM)(kg) and lean body mass (LM) (total, arms, legs and trunk) (kg) as well as fat mass index (FMI) and fat free mass index (FFMI)(kg.m-2). The anthropometric differences were identified using Mann Whitney's non-parametric test. Results The data collected from the VII's players differed significantly from those of the XVs players. Athletes playing VII's rugby have a lower body mass (68.0 ± 6.5 kg vs 74.8 ± 10.8 kg), a lower BMI (23.3 ± 1.6 kg/m2), a lower body fat percentage, (18.4 ± 3% vs 23 ± 4.6%), a lower bone mineral content (2.8 ± 0.3 kg vs 3.1 ± 0.4 kg), a lower total (11.7 ± 2.7 kg vs 16.3 ± 5.3 kg) as well as regional fat mass compared to XVs players. The fat mass index was also in favour of the VII's players (P < 0.001) (4.0 ± 0.9 kg/m2 vs 5.5 ± 1.7/m2). Similar differences (p < 0.05) were found comparing the forward players from the VII's and the XV's team. However, no such difference was observed when analysing the back players data between the two groups. When comparing back players and forward players within the XV's rugby team, similar significant differences were found (P < 0.05) regarding those same variables. On top of that, the total fat mass (54.0 ± 5.0 kg vs 46.3 ± 3.8 kg; P < 0.001) as well as the regional fat mass showed to be more important in the players playing at a forward position. The Fat Free Mass Index was also more important for the forward players (18.9 ± 1.2 vs 17.3 ± 1.0 kg.m2). On the other hand, when looking at the VII's rugby team, the BMI was the only variable with a statistically significant difference between back (22.8 ± 1.50) and forward players (24.1 ± 1.52). However, no statistical difference was demonstrated in any of the variables when comparing the back players of the XV's team and the VII's team (including both back and forward players). Conclusion This is the first study analysing the differences regarding anthropometric profiles and body composition in women's professional rugby players from national XV's and VII's rugby team. The results of the study confirm that VII's players are in fact more athletic than XV's rugby players. However, when comparing anthropometric profiles between VII's players and XV's back players, no significant difference is observed.
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