Originally Posted by
RChung
This chart quite nicely demonstrates that cyclist body weight scales approximately as height squared. Maybe even a bit faster. If I ignore the 1.65 cm / 70 kg (5'5" / 154 lbs) outlier (wonder who that was?), looks like the trend is for median BMI 20.5 at height 5'5" and median BMI 22 at height 6'3". Though this could be self-selection (5'5" tall riders are naturally good at climbing and they are motivated to lose a few extra pounds, whereas 6'3" guys aren't competitive at KOMs anyway so it's less crucial for them). If the trend is for higher BMI at higher height, that further increases the advantage short guys have at climbing.
You can also see that the median height of a TdF rider is about 1.79 m (5' 10.5"), which is only slightly higher than the median of a 20-29 year old U.S. male (1.78 m or 5'10"). So, TdF riders are pretty representative of general population, unlike NBA players.