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Richard Kenyon, 33, who plays rugby for Fylde and Lancashire rugby club, was holidaying at the Low Briery Holiday Village in Keswick, Cumbria, when the incident occurred.
His wife Johanna Kenyon woke up at 6.30am on Sunday to feed their eight-month-old son, Charlie, when she spotted the man rummaging through the family Range Rover.
Her instantaneous reaction was to wake her husband who leapt from the bed and gave chase, sprinting up a hill, along a disused railway track, down a footpath beside a river and into a forest barefoot before gaining on the purse-snatching perpetrator.
Mr Kenyon then described how he made the tackle of his life with "perfect technique and perfect timing".
He told the Daily Mail: "The adrenaline kicked in and I wasn't going to stand by and let this happen.
"The thief turned on to a dirt track in a vain attempt to get away but I closed him down, he turned around and I could see the fear in his eyes.
"This was only going to end one way and he knew it. I think he realised I was a bit bigger than him.
"I executed a textbook rugby tackle and brought him to the ground. It was the best tackle I have ever made.
"I escorted him back to the caravan and the police arrived and arrested him."
Kenyon explained that his wife's purse had been tossed into a nearby river and was eventually recovered.
A spokesman for Cumbria Police said a 40-year-old man from the Tyne and Wear area had been charged with two offences of theft in connection with the incident and is due to appear at Newcastle Magistrates Court on May 30.