19:30 15 May 2014
The body mass index is revealing itself to be a dubious measure of health. If yours is 25 or over you are officially overweight – now take a look at some of the athletes who took part in the London 2012 Olympics Sally Adee
Read more: "Survival of the fattest: Why we're wrong about obesity"
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Bertrand Gille (left) and Didier Dinart helped snare the gold medal for the French handball team at London 2012. According to current measures of assessing health, Dinart's BMI (26.8) was well into the overweight category. Bertrand's, at 28, was approaching obese – indeed, before 1998, when the US National Institutes of Health pushed its malleable definition of obesity from 27 to 30, a US doctor might have had sharp words for him about his condition.
Our measures of BMI are all based on data provided by Olympic Broadcasting Services and the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
(Image: Christophe Simon/AFP/Getty)
