Late last year after three years of near daily use, my trusty Serfas RX gloves disintegrated into nothing.
On the hunt for a replacement and out of touch with the cycling glove scene, I set about searching for a glove that would hopefully last me as long as my RXs did.
After checking out Taiwan’s woefully inadequate Giant gloves scene (seriously, try and buy cycling gloves here that aren’t Giant branded or some noname cheap Chinese crappy brand), I decided to hit the internet and see what was on offer.
After a few weeks of deliberation, I finally decided to try out the Castelli Pro Gel Light cycling glove
After six months or so of use, here’s what I think of them.
There’s two things you’ll immediately notice when you first try on a pair of Castelli Pro Light gloves.
The first is that they make you look like Spiderman, and the second is that they come preshipped with a godawful smell. I don’t know what Castelli do to the Pro Light gloves at the factory, but the smell they arrive with that comes from the plastic mesh covering the gel inserts is terrible.
For the first month or so of use you walk around with really bad chemically smelling hands. After six months of near daily use, I can still get a faint whiff of the manufacturing smell if I hold the gloves up to my nose, but thankfully it’s stopped transferring onto my hands.
Fit wise the Pro Light is reasonable. I have large hands and opted for the ‘extra large’ size. I personally found the Serfas RX much more contoured and well fitting on my hand in general compared to the Castelli Pro Lights.
The difference can be equated to a pair of well fitting jeans (the RXs) vs. buying some ill fitting crap that feels like you’re walking around with boxes over your legs.
One particular area the Castellis fail fit wise is around the wrists. When I’m riding I can’t help but notice the gaping holes the gloves make around my wrists.
This I assume is due to relying on elastic to secure the gloves around your wrist rather than a better fitting velcro strap.
Padding wise I was a bit skeptical about the plastic mesh covering the gel inserts but surprisingly it’s held up well. The Pro Light glove has three inserts in total, one across the top and two larger ones in the palm area.
I dunno much about the ergonomics of pad placement but the Pro Lights seem to have the pads in the right places and of a suitable thickness as I get no discomfort riding.
The longest I’ve been in the saddle was just over eight hours with these gloves and I had no dramas at all.
Durability wise though I can’t say the same. To date nothing has gone wrong with the Castellis but I am noticing the stitching is starting to come undone all over the place.
Whether or not this is means my gloves are going to fall apart in the near future or not I don’t know but it does make the gloves look untidy. One culprit I think is the fact that even though their advertised to come with them, my Pro Lights didn’t have any finger tabs on them.
This means that in order to take the Pro Lights off, I have to pull at the gloves themselves (typically around the little finger and tab where the wrist is (which probably isn’t helping with the elasticity of the wrist area of the glove either).
Unfortunately this is unavoidable as there’s no other way to cleanly take the gloves off without the advertised finger tabs. Whether or not the Pro Lights last as long as my RXs remains to be seen.
Stitching aside though, so far the Pro Lights are wearing in nicely and you can see the wear points below;
The palm material does feel a bit cheap (and thin!) but so far so good. I could be a bit biased coming from my RXs in which the palm material was much thicker and ‘clothy’ feeling.
For the pricepoint the Castelli Pro Light gloves
Would I buy another pair? Probably not (I need my finger tabs!) but for someone looking for a comfortable summer glove the Castelli Pro Light glove delivers decent quality at an affordable price.
I’ll publish an update when they eventually start to fall apart from wear and tear so stay tuned for that. Although if the Castellis last anywhere as long as the Serfas RXs, it might just be a while yet.