After declaring 650b to be their wheel size of choice, Giant have somewhat neglected the Anthem 29er. An important bike for Giant in South Africa, the Anthem has been rolling around on much the same frame since 2012. But that is all set to change with the 2018 Anthem.
The new 2018 Anthem can be viewed at the Giant Durbanville store.
Unfortunately, other than being able to take these pictures, and a quick inspection of the bike, we do not have any official details on the new Anthem.
There are obvious changes to the geometry with the bike looking slacker and longer. Our crude attempt at measuring the head angle puts it 1.5 degrees slacker than the previous platform at around 70 degrees. The chainstays are significantly shorter at 440 mm with a noticeably longer top tube length. The head tube also appears to be shorter with a lower stack height.
The all-new rocker link is a single carbon piece and is adapted for a metric shock with trunnion mounting. The rear travel is said to be 90 mm while the front fork is set to 100 mm. The axle sizing is Boost 110 front and 148 rear with both ends using a stealth thru axle system.
There is provision to mount a side swing direct mount front derailleur on the seat tube to run the bike in a double chainring configuration. There is internal cable routing with integrated protection on the drive side chainstay and a rubber protector on the underside of the seatstay. The new Anthem fits a 27.2 mm seatpost.
The Anthem 2 specification
The model pictured is the aluminium Anthem 2. The Large sized bike weighed 13.2 kilograms with Shimano SPD pedals and bottle cage attached.
It comes kitted with a Fox Performance SC fork and DPS shock, and a Shimano SLX 1×11 drivetrain (11-42 cassette and 32T chainring) while the brakes are Shimano Deore.
The wheels are from Giant with the labelling displaying a width of 29 mm (we’re unsure whether this is the internal or external measure). The rims are wrapped with a pair of Racing Ralph tyres. Both the wheels and tyres are tubeless ready. The handlebars are generous at 780 mm and are attached to an 80 mm stem on the Large model. The saddle and grips as pictured are not the original equipment and different models will appear on the final specification of the Anthem 2.
The official launch of the new Giant Anthem is expected near the end of April.
