Carter Woods launched his 2026 season with a win and a second place at the Langford Canada Cup over the weekend. He did so about his team-issue Giant Anthem.
After a South African training camp with the Giant Factory Off-Road Team in January, the Vancouver Island Canada Cup was Woods’ first start line of a long season. He’s off to Arkansas then California for a few more race starts before heading to South Korea to re-join the team for the first World Cup of 2026.
Bike Check: Carter Woods’ team-issue Giant Anthem
The Anthem is Giant’s recently-revised cross country race whip. It brings the brand in line with the trend towards top-tube mounted shocks and flex-pivot rear triangles. But there are a few tricks that make the Anthem stand out from the field, beyond just that high-gloss paint.
With 120mm travel front and rear, Giant eschews the minimalist travel approach that Trek and Specialized tried to take XC down over the last few years. That kept the Anthem well suited to the rougher, gravity-focused trails at the Jordie Lunn Bike Park course as well as, obviously, the increasingly technical World Cup courses these days.
It’s always fun to have your own name on the top tube. Giant’s Anthem uses a swing link to push that Fox Float SL. There’s a flip-chip, iwth high/low options to adjust the frame’s geometry and tidy routing for a good, old-fashioned cable lock-out on that shock. Wood’s team mechanic, Kevin Smith, mentioned that they had played around iwth Fox’s Live Valve Neo system a bit after seeing some of the Cannondale riders find success on it last season but aren’t going in that direction just yet.
There’s a lot of Shimano’s Di2 showing up at races these days, among Giant-sponsored teams like GFORT and others. Carter’s running a hefty 36-tooth CSixx power meter chainring. Giant bought Stages power meters a few years back.
Smith also said Woods will go back and forth bewteen the 10-45 cassette/short cage XTR combo and standard 10-51 cassette XTR configuration. Which he runs depends on what kind of race and the course. Short tracks are often 9-45 while XCO sees the Canadian lean toward the 10-51, though teammate (and world champion) Alan Hatherly pushing the 9-45 group during more XCO’s has others on the team considering that option more too.
Woods is running a Fox 34 SL up front, again with 120mm travel. Fox is moving the 32, it’s old XC fork, more towards marathon racing while the 34 loses enough weight to be competitive, and tough enough for XC racing. Again, with a remote lock-out for efficiency.
With the sun coming out for Saturday’s XCO, even if the temperatures weren’t particularly warm, trail conditions were near perfect for racing. That meant Maxxis’ ultra-fast Aspen was the choice for Giant’s carbon-spoked XCR Wheelsystem. The Burgtech mudguard didn’t see much use.