England star Mason Billington has declared that the Wheelchair World Cup is an “arms race” as the defending champions prepare to play for the first time with lightweight customised chairs they believe gives them an edge over rivals.

The England team, who won an epic World Cup final against France in 2022, will play in 14kg titanium chairs which are up to 8kg lighter than those used by some of their opponents.

The new chairs were customised for each player during a weekend of fitting and testing in Wales by manufacturer Vulcan Sport, and now the world champions are ready to unveil them in their opening match against Wales at WIN Entertainment Centre on October 30.

“We've been developing a very specific rugby league chair, and I'm excited to see how they do in this World Cup,” said Billington, who is one of three new faces from the team that won the last World Cup in 2022. 

“No chair is going to be miles ahead of the next chair, but it's all about those one percenters.

“If we can have less punctures on the pitch where we have to stop the flow of our team, if we can have slightly more grippy tyres that take away the chances of slipping, if our bearings roll a tenth of a second quicker than the next chair's bearings, it's all of these one percenters that add up for us.”

Just as technology has had an impact in other sports such as cycling, Billington predicted that rival teams would look at ways to improve the performance of their wheelchairs if England were successful at RLWC26.

“It's definitely an arms race when it comes to our sport, with our new chairs and the new chair designs, and the materials being used,” he said.

“It ultimately comes down to how you play the sport but the chairs are a part of it; the same as in cycling, the same as F1."

Inaugural IRL Wheelchair Golden Boot winner Jack Brown also made comparisons with Formula One racing after coverage of the Wheelchair Super League grand final showed him using a hacksaw to modify his chair at halftime.

“Imagine if you went to watch the F1 and you expected Lewis Hamilton to win the race but you put him in a Ford Focus. You need a car that’s fit for you and does what it’s supposed to do,” Brown said after helping Halifax Panthers to a comfortable 64-24 win over Leeds Rhinos.

That's exactly what the England stars expect their custom fitted chairs to do. 

Another Golden Boot winner, Rob Hawkins, the first player in any discipline to win the award in back-to-back seasons, explained the benefits of England's specially designed chairs.

“With the chairs being more customised and more fitted to the player, you can get up to speed a bit quicker or you can have those sharper turns a lot quicker and a lot better,” Hawkins said.

“We had another set of titanium chairs, but they just weren't as lightweight as what Vulcan did for us.

“When we went to see them last year to do like a full chair modelling, they sat us in this frame, and they could basically move parts, so they can move our feet forward, backwards and get exact measurements for every aspect of the chair - whether that's where the footplate is, where you want your wheels to be, the backrest, and they moved it all and printed the exact measurements.

“They've come to a lot of our sessions earlier on this year and basically any changes that we need to do to the chairs or any adaptations, they've been straight on it with us, which has been amazing.

“They are lighter, but they can also take a hit."

However, Hawkins insists the new chairs won't guarantee England win the eight-team World Cup, which will be staged in Wollongong in its entirety. 

“We want to keep that No.1 spot, and thankfully we have got the equipment to help us with that but it's down to us to perform on the pitch," he said.

“I don't see a team that can beat us when it comes to connectivity, because we're always making room to spend time with each other, whether that's going out together or having a little Formula One tournament on Xbox in the team room, so we're really healthy and we can't wait to get started."