bike review

Giant anthem X 29er versus trance X 29erPhotograPhy by craiG madsen

aNTheM X - fRaMe

We tested the Anthem X Advanced 29er 1,

which features a carbon front end mated

to an aluminium back end. Like the 26er of

old, the 29er Anthem features 100mm of

Maestro virtual pivot suspension via a Rock

Shox Monarch RL out back, and a 100mm

Rock Shox Sid fork up front. With a 71

degree head angle (it’s bang on, whereas

we’ve measured the alloy Anthem at 70

degrees in the past) and a 73 degree seat

angle, the Anthem has classic ‘race bike

geometry’, albeit in a 29er package. Tyre

clearance out back is not huge, but sufficient

for the 2.25 Racing Ralphs fitted, and just

enough for 2.25 Nobby Nics. There was

no dropper-post fitted, but we noted the

guides present under the top tube - tidy.

aNTheM X - BiTs

All the running gear is Shimano XT 10

speed (save for the SLX cassette and a

KMC chain - sneaky cost saving measures

right there). The dual ring 26/38 crankset

is well suited to the bike’s XC intentions,

though we have to admit we didn’t use

the biggest gear available once and riders

without legs of steel might find the 26/36

combo insufficiently low, depending on the

steepest, longest climbs they do regularly.

The XT brakes were strong and flawless -

‘nuff said. Wheels were Giant’s own P XCR

29er 1 with eyelets for longevity, fitted with

Schwalbe’s Racing Ralphs, Tubeless Ready.

The Sid fork features a 15mm thru axle,

rebound adjust and a lock out - just what

any aspiring XC racer is looking for. The rear

shock was an odd one in this present age,

with no adjustable compression damping,

but a full lock-out.

aNTheM X - RiDe

The Anthem X is fast right from the first

pedal stroke. That’s partly due to the fast

rolling Racing Ralph tyres - if making ground

is your aim, these tyres are on your side.

Giant’s Maestro suspension also helps,

remaining neutral under pedal tension in

either chainring, albeit with slightly more

softness underfoot in the big ring. The rear

Giant have jumped into the 29er market full-bore, with neither their venerable anthem X nor Trance X models now available in 26er. Nope, it’s 29er only now, until you get to the 150mm travel, 26er-only Reign X. alright, so if you’re considering a Giant in the 100-120 travel range, wheel size won’t enter into the decision, but should you get the anthem X or the Trance X? is it a choice between a twitchy, race-head Xc speedster, and a lazy, burly, trail-eating huck-meister? We got hold of one of each to find out: the anthem X advanced 29er 1 ($5399) and the Trance X 29er 0 ($5199).

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suspension is active and tends to use 90%

if its travel on most rides, which is what

we’re looking for in a short travel XC set-up.

Unfortunately, we soon had a problem with

the rear shock leaking air. Tightening the

air valve did not yield a solution, so it went

back to Giant who replaced it with a Rock

Shox Monarch RT from the next model up in

the range. The RT shock has a dial to adjust

the level of compression damping and felt

very different to the RL. We ran the RT in its

softest compression and rebound settings,

otherwise it felt like it stifled the Anthem’s

travel and bounce. So while the RT was set

and forget, it was biased very much towards

removing any unwanted suspension

movement at the cost of some wanted

suspension movement, though it felt better

the harder and fast we went. In fairness to

Giant, speccing a more XC oriented shock

on the next model up makes some sense -

those looking to spend more on the models

higher in the range of XC bikes are going to

be more focussed on speed than comfort.

Either way, for general riding, we preferred

the Monarch RL, which the bike comes stock

with.

Up front, we found the Sid did its job very

nicely indeed. With a 15mm thru-axle and

a tapered steerer, it’s plenty stiff for its job,

though it quickly runs out of travel if you try

whacking into big things at speed. However,

the anthem’s repLacement rock shox rt in pLace – we preferred the stock rL

shimano xt Brakes on Both anthem and trance were superB, as aLways

schwaLBe noBBy nics were perfect for the trance

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we didn’t have much motivation to ride

like that, because the Racing Ralphs just

weren’t our friends when taken off groomed

surfaces. Running tubes, we had to run quite

high pressures to avoid pinch-flatting the

thin sidewalls and pumped up hard they

tended to bounce off things and skitter

across the top of loose ground. Colour us

cautious when it got fast or steep! Just for

fun, we swapped to 2.25” Nobby Nicks with

tougher sidewalls, ran them around 28 psi

and enjoyed the ride substantially more,

albeit with a slight loss of pedalling speed

on groomed XC trails - horses for courses.

The bolt-up seat-post was a bit of a kick in

the teeth to riders used to dropping their

seats, but hey, we used to ride everything

with our seats up and it is an XC race bike

(and routing for a dropper is included if you

decide to fit one).

One thing worth noting: the steeper than

we’ve ridden in a while head angle did mean

we had to pay attention more on steep

descents, but it also meant we whipped

around uphill corners with an inside line we

hadn’t realised we’d been missing until the

Anthem showed us how an XC bike is meant

to corner. It wasn’t just that it was quicker,

it was easier with no need to think about

how to negotiate the uphill corners - though

that did leave us with only a focus on the

burning sensation in our legs (shut-up legs!).

Overall, the Anthem X is a great XC racer:

it pedals well, takes out moderately rough

ground well, steers rapidly and is generally

pretty darned fast. It was out of its depth on

Giant’s dropper-post performed weLL

rock shox sid on the anthem was structuraLLy stiff and functionaLLy pLush – ideaL

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rougher riding, though we found this can

be partly remedied with a tyre swap, before

the next bottleneck for reckless riding kicks

in, which would be the steep head angle

and limited travel. Lastly, in case you didn’t

notice, the Anthem looks good, with straight

lines and a classic double-diamond shape.

Which leads us to the bigger (uglier?) cousin,

the Trance X…

TRaNce X - fRaMe

The Trance X 0 29er frame is all aluminium,

or ALUXX SL as Giant calls the particular type

employed here, and you’d be hard pressed

to find a straight tube, with all manner of

shaping and manipulating present and

accounted for. The 120mm (5 inches) of

Maestro virtual pivot point suspension is fed

into a Fox CTD Boost Valve shock. Like the

Anthem, a tapered headtube keeps things

modern up front and like the Anthem,

Giant’s own 1.25 ‘Overdrive 2’ standard is

used on the steerer and stem. Sorry Giant,

but we’ve got to call this ‘standard’ out as

meaningless in terms of there being no

noticeable increase in stiffness and a right

pain when it comes to switching stems as

standard 1.125 stems will not fit and at this

stage Giant are the only producers of their

stem size. Our test bike came with a 90mm

stem, we’d have preferred a 70mm but had

to make do with an 80mm as this was the

shortest in stock. . The Trance employed

some internal cable routing, which looks

tidy, but the rear derailleur inner cable was

exposed along the seatstay, which is where

shimano xt cLutch rear deraiLLeur – a tick for the trance

fox’s ctd shock on the trance compLemented Giant’s maestro suspension

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the worst of winter’s gunge tends to get in,

so that seemed like a missed opportunity.

A 69.5 head angle is on the steep end of

things for a trail-oriented 29er these days.

Don’t be fooled by looking at the Trance

online though - we’ve had several people

comment that it looks like the front end of

the Anthem X 29er has been rammed by

something - the headtube looks oddly steep,

perhaps exacerbated by visual contrast to

the slack seat angle. We actually measured

the bike online and have come to the

conclusion that the Trance X on screen must

be a pre-production model because the

online picture is two degrees steeper than

the bike is in real life. Just as notable in the

angles and fit department is the seat angle,

which comes forward then arcs back very

slackly, meaning you’ll need to run the seat a

long way forward the further up you put the

seat. Giant’s own dropper-post worked well,

but its layback only exacerbated this slack-

seating fit-feature of the Trance X.

TRaNce X - BiTs

A Fox Float 32 CTD with 120mm of travel

graced the front end. Shimano comes to the

party with a 10 speed drivetrain, this time

with the welcome addition of a clutch rear

derailleur to lessen chain slap, though we

found there was still quite a bit of chainslap

to be had. We’re not sure if this is due to the

low chainstay, or if the clutch would have

benefited from being tightened up a bit. A

double ring crankset was again fitted, this

time with a 24 tooth small ring, the lower

gear making more sense for the trail bike

intentions of the Trance, though it was a big

jump up to the 38 (34 or 36 might have been

ideal). Giant’s P-TRX 29er 1 wheelset shod

with Schwalbe 2.25 Nobby Nics kept things

spinning along.

TRaNce X - RiDe

First off, on the first hill, one of our testers

struggled noticeably on the Trance, versus

the Anthem. He commented that the

shock seemed soft, despite having the

recommended 25% sag, and that uphill

efforts were much harder than on the

Anthem. After some adjustments, he found

that the slack seat angle was loading up the

shock once the bike was pointing uphill,

making for a harder ride than it should have

been. Sliding the seat forward helped a lot.

Still, some of our testers thought the Fox

shock needed to be run in at least Trail mode

to get effective climbing out of the Trance,

while others who like a bike’s suspension

to be active over bumps while climbing

thought it was just fine in Descend mode

and found Climb mode to be very overly

stiff. Either way, the CTD shock has three

effective options to choose from, regardless

of your preferences.

Ripping along undulating singletrack, the

Trance X is noticeably plusher than the

Anthem, which translates into more fun

and more speed the rougher it gets. More

than anything though, the sturdier larger

knobbed tyres could be run a bit softer,

which provided more comfort, speed and

grip in these same situations - and there was

more clearance for those big tyres. Down

steep descents the Trance X was noticeably

more comfortable than the Anthem, with

the slacker head angle and an extra inch of

suspension in reserve. However, it wasn’t as

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Giant trance X 29er 0 Giant anthem X advanced 29er 1

frame Composite front triangle, aLUXX SL-Grade aluminium rear

rear traveL 100mm

front traveL 100mm

fork rockShox SID rL w/15Qr thru-axle

rear ShoCk rockShox monarch rL

wheeLSet Giant P-XCr 29er 1 wheelSystem

ShIfterS Shimano Deore Xt, 2x10 Speed

front DeraILLeUr Shimano Deore Xt

rear DeraILLeUr Shimano Deore Xt

CaSSette Shimano SLX 11x36, 10-Speed

ChaIn kmC X10SL

CrankSet Shimano Deore Xt, 26/38

BrakeS Shimano Deore Xt hydraulic, 160mm

tyreS Schwalbe racing ralph, 29x2.25 evolution tL ready

SIzeS XS,S,m,L,XL

CoLoUr Composite/white/red

weIGht aS teSteD 12.0kg

PrICe $5399

BIke SUPPLIeD By Giant Bikes nz. www.giant-bicycles.com

frame aLUXX SL-Grade aluminium

rear traveL 120mm

front traveL 120mm

fork fox 32 float 29 fIt CtD w/ 15Qr thru-axle

rear ShoCk fox float CtD Boostvalve

wheeLSet Giant P-trX 29er 1 wheelSystem

ShIfterS Shimano Deore Xt, 2x10 Speed

front DeraILLeUr Shimano Deore Xt

rear DeraILLeUr Shimano Deore Xt Shadow

CaSSette Shimano hG81 11x36, 10-Speed

ChaIn kmC X10

CrankSet Shimano Deore Xt, 24/38

BrakeS Shimano Deore Xt hydraulic

tyreS Schwalbe nobby nic, 29x2.25 tL ready

SIzeS XS,S,m,L,XL

CoLoUr Polished/white/blue

weIGht aS teSteD 13.1 kg

PrICe $5199

BIke SUPPLIeD By Giant Bikes nz. www.giant-bicycles.com

confidence-inspiring as some of the newer

breed of trail 29ers - the Trance X is still

erring on the side of XC-trail, rather than

gnarly all-mountain. Let’s not undersell the

Trance X though, because under the right

rider, the Trance X is certainly not going to

hold you back at a gnarly Enduro event, as

evidenced by U.S pro Adam Craig’s tendency

to get on the podium aboard one. The Giant

dropper-post was a welcome inclusion on

the Trance X and one we employed often.

It was our first time using Giant’s version of

this new must-have item and we came away

pleased with it, especially the tidy remote,

though due to the Trance X’s slack seat angle

we wonder if some might need to swap it

out for something with an inline head.

Which oNe?!

At the end of our test period the differences

were clear to us, but those differences are

not huge. The Anthem X is noticeably a bit

more capable than the old 26er, which we’ve

commented on in a previous review, so it’s

not a total race-head bike, and the Trance X

is still capable of ripping along under pedal

power and isn’t one of the slacker/slower

29ers we’re seeing more of this year. The

Anthem weighed in at 12kg (26.5lbs) while

the Trance was 13.1 (29 lbs) including the

dropper-post, so despite the carbon and less

travel, there aren’t huge amounts at stake

here on the weight front. Most riders could

be very happy on either bike and a tyre

change could go a long way to evening up

the differences. We’d say if your aim is to go

fast most of the time, with a fair bit of racing,

then go the Anthem. And if your aim is to

ride trails with maybe an occasional event,

the Trance X is your better bet.

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