Gaia Masetti, a 22-year-old rising star in women’s WorldTour cycling, began her journey with a passion for the sport from childhood. Turning pro at 21 with AG Insurance Soudal, she reflects on early successes, the challenges she overcame, and how cyclocross honed her technical skills. Gaia shares her love for Italian food, favorite races, and gear, and offers a glimpse into her personal playlist and ambitions for future victories.

Athletes often strive to reach peak performance, but this can lead to low energy availability and the serious condition known as Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (RED-S). RED-S can affect both health and performance, making it crucial to understand. In recent podcast episodes, we explore what RED-S is, its complex diagnosis, and its impact on athletes at all levels.

The Castelli Podcast recap is a monthly episode highlighting some of the best bits from one of our past podcast episodes. This recap features sports nutritionist Dani Hofstetter, discussing balanced nutrition, fueling strategies, protein sources, and optimal intake for peak athletic performance. You can find the full 57-minute episode from November 29, 2023.

In this 'petite' episode, we provide a quick introduction to La Grande Boucle, covering its history, iconic climbs, and leader jerseys. We also highlight early champions, pioneers, and the evolution of team sponsorship. Enjoy the episode!

In this episode, South African champion Ashleigh Moolman Pasio discusses her move to Banyoles, her Rocacorba Cycling business, and her QOM Strava record on Rocacorba, along with pacing advice for achieving personal records. While Rocacorba won't reach the fame of Alpe d'Huez or Stelvio, it has gained notable recognition in cycling folklore.

In this episode, we meet Ilse Pluimers, a talented athlete from the AG Insurance Soudal team, excelling in both cyclocross and road cycling. Ilse discusses her passion for both sports, shares insider tips on balancing her road career with winter cyclocross racing, and expresses her love for one-day cobble races like Paris-Roubaix, highlighting her dedication to cycling.

In this episode, we delve into the topic of fueling for race days, ultra events, or triathlons, discussing how to prevent or recover from 'hitting the wall' (also known as bunking), sports drinks, and more on nutrition. This advice comes straight from sports nutrition expert Dani Hofstetter.

On this episode, we are joined by the British road and track cyclist, Ethan Vernon, who will give us a rundown of his favorite winter pieces to combat the cold and wet weather when training in the UK.

We’ll also chat about his hugely successful first season as a WorldTour pro. He got off to a great start winning a couple of stages at the Tour of Slovakia, and Volta Catalunya. Of course, none of this should come as a surprise given his pedigree on the track - he’s currently a Team Pursuit and Elimination World Champion for Team GB.

Along with the usual fun and casual stuff like his passion for coffee, pre-training breakfast, this episode has something for everyone.

We hope you’ll enjoy the episode!

The Gabba – The professional’s foul-weather friend. In 2010, Castelli introduced the Gabba to the pros and changed the way pros race in wet and cold conditions. A real game-changer compared to traditional flapping rain jackets, it is safe to say that it became the most iconic and most well-known piece of kit in cycling.  For many years, it was an exclusive lifesaver for Castelli riders (and pros who bought one to black out logos), copied by several brands but never as trusted as Castelli’s original, which has been improved several times in the past few years.  The Gabba RoS Jacket exemplifies everything we do at Castelli. We're always looking for innovative ways to make cycling more fun, more comfortable, and, most importantly, faster, regardless of what Mother Nature throws at you.  This is the story of how everything began, together with a focus group of riders from the Cervélo TestTeam in 2009.

WHAT’S YOUR GABBA STORY?
Head over to our Instagram or Facebook and leave your favorite Gabba moment or story from the podcast episode in the comments. We have 4 Gabba Jackets up for grabs!

In this episode, we'll take a deep dive into the elite men's race, discussing the course, race favorites, tactics, weather, the aero performance gear the Italian national team will be wearing, and how to fuel to maximize performance for such a challenging race distance.

Joining us today, we have Team Italia's very experienced leader, Matteo Trentin, with 8 Road World Championships under his belt.

Dani Hofstetter, a professional sports nutritionist, will provide us with insights on how to face such a long and demanding race as the elite men's road race.

Last but not least, our third guest is Castelli's in-house race performance product specialist, who will give us some insights into what the Italian team will have in their cycling clothing arsenal for the road races.