Radio over Fibre (RoF) is being considered for indoor and outdoor distributed antenna systems for the support of IEEE 802.11 wireless networks. The 802.11 Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol, however, has not been designed to account for the optical distribution network. The research work presented in this thesis has focused on the analysis of protocol effects in 802.11 over fibre networks and the application of new features in order to improve the protocol's performance. This study is based on numerical analysis, supported in part by analytical approximations, and experimental measurements.