I disagree.People listen to the experts which say they don't get that big but maybe the recommended aquarium size is a just a bad joke and these fish are being stunted.
My reference as to size in the wild came from a friend of mine who spent 6 months working for the late Stuart Grant, on location at Lake Malawi. When returning one of the first things he commented to me about was the size of Malawi cichlids in captivity, vs those in the wild - especially the Aulonocara genus. I've seen hundreds, perhaps thousands of photos of these fish taken in the wild, along with hundreds of wild caught specimens (some that I have personally owned), and never seen a single Aulonocara in the 7-8" size. My friend never did either, in 6 months of diving among these fish. Interestingly enough, one of the species that he said was often grossly oversized in captivity was jacobfreibergi.
This is not to say that one can't get these fish to these massive sizes in captivity, I have also seen 7" Labidochromis caeruleus in aquariums - a fish that in the wild averages 2.5-3.5". (f/m) Most experts are referring to wild specimens, living and eating in the wild - not those being kept in captivity and fed nutrient rich diets 3-4 times a day.