Pope Leo’s Personal Trainer Reveals Shock at Learning Client Became Next Pontiff | News Channel 3-12

Pope Leo’s personal trainer reveals shock at learning client became next pontiff | News Channel 3-12

By Caitlin Danaher, Sharon Braithwaite and Christopher Lamb, CNN (CNN) — An Italian personal trainer has spoken of his shock after learning his client for two years had been elected to lead the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics as Pope. “Here in the gym, no one knew that Robert, now Leo XIV, was a cardinal, least of all me who trained him,” Valerio Masella, 26, told the Italian newspaper Il Messaggero. The Pope, then Cardinal Robert Prevost, trained…

Robert Prevost went to a fitness centre in Rome two or three times a week. His coach did not know that he was a cardinal – until he saw him in the papal robe on the balcony.

Cardinal Robert Prevost's personal trainer didn't know who he was. He trained with me for two years. I recognized him when he stood on the balcony of St. Peter's Basilica after the conclave, Valerio Masella told the daily Il Messaggero from a gym near the Vatican. The then prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops used to come there.

Valerio Masella is the coach who followed Prevost in the gym attached to the Vatican attended by the former cardinal from 2023