mountain bikes: Test: Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29 – Potent fun machine

Test: The Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29 surprised in the test with great performance on the trail, despite little travel. In view of the good equipment, the bike is also extremely attractively priced for less than 5.000 euros.

Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29: frame and geometry

The Giant Trance, along with the Stumpy and Scott's Genius , is one of the longest-serving all-around trail bikes still available in 2019. While the current Trance doesn't have much in common with its predecessors, two fundamental ingredients remain the same even 15 years later: its universal capability for everything forests, mountains, and flatlands have to offer, and the Maestro rear suspension. The 2019 Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29 comes with 115mm of rear travel and 130mm up front. At first glance, this seems rather limited for an all-rounder, but—to cut to the chase—the Trance demonstrates that it's not the quantity of travel that matters, but its quality.

The Trance comes this season with both aluminum and carbon frames and makes friends of 29ers just as happy as fans of 650b. A new addition is the Trance Jr., a small model especially for young people. In the test, we had the Trance Advanced Pro 29, the top version of the 29er, of course with a carbon frame and high-quality, well thought-out equipment, but with more emphasis on practicality than on "bling bling" - that explains it relatively low price: these days, 4.799 euros is almost a bargain for a top-of-the-range MTB model with a carbon frame.

The Maestro rear end from Giant stands like a rock in the fast-moving MTB world and is of course also part of the new Trance. No wonder: the self-interpretation of the VPP system has proven itself and simply works very well. For several seasons, Giant has also been using trunnion mount shocks, which accommodate a lot of travel despite their compact dimensions. The advantage for the rider: Thanks to the low transmission ratio, the rear end can be fine-tuned and even heavy riders stay far away from the maximum pressure.

With the geometry of the 2019 Trance, Giant shows sensitivity to current market trends without forgetting what made the bike so popular in the past. Although the main frame of the trail evergreen is now quite long, short chainstays and the moderately slack head angle keep the wheelbase pleasantly short so as not to take away from the bike's maneuverability.

Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29: Features

As already mentioned, the Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29 costs 4.799 euros as we tested it. On the one hand, that's a lot of money for a bike, but a closer look shows that the bike giant from Taiwan was able to put together an extremely attractive overall package. The Fox chassis consisting of the 34mm fork at the front and the DPX2 damper at the rear comes as a performance variant - compared to the factory version you have to make do with the slightly simpler grip damping, but this is completely sufficient for the vast majority of applications and drivers - another advantage : Due to the somewhat limited adjustment options for compression and rebound, the right setup can be found quickly, even for beginners. The fact that the slightly lighter 34 fork is used in the front and not the 36 like some other bikes in the test field is only logical given the spring travel of 130mm and the slightly lower stiffness should only really be noticed by a few.

With the Sram GX Eagle drive, the currently most popular drive in the MTB sector changes gears on the Trance. 500% bandwidth, reliable performance, attractive price - there's really not much to complain about here. Lightweight construction fans would perhaps wish for a gram or two less; On the other hand: At 12,5kg, the Giant is one of the lightest bikes in our test field.

In-house parts from Giant are used for the cockpit, wheels, saddle and post. However, this is by no means to be understood as criticism, because the add-on parts are of excellent quality and do not have to hide from the competition. The Contact Switch dropper support has now also been given an ergonomically successful lever and thus delivers a great performance. The wheels are equipped with 26mm wide carbon rims, are light and gave us no reason for criticism. The same applies to the surprisingly powerful tires: The Maxxis combination of DHF at the front and DHRII at the rear would also fit well on an enduro. So you have to make a few compromises in terms of rolling resistance, but you can really let it rip on the trail.

Giant Trance Advanced Pro 29: On the trail

With 115mm of travel at the rear, you might expect a full marathon feeling going uphill. Unfortunately, such high expectations of the Trance's uphill behavior are likely to be disappointed. Despite this, the Trance is one of the fast climbers in the test field. This is due to the relatively low weight and the good geometry. The front wheel stays on the ground, you can concentrate on pedaling. A 30 chainring with a 12-speed Eagle cassette offers enough bandwidth in any case. The fact that the rear end still wobbles a bit even in blocked mode or uphill mode is not so important.

On the descent, too, it becomes clear that categorizing the trance by spring travel makes little sense. For the short lift at the rear, you can let the gas stand properly. Not only because the rear end is very responsive, but also because the geometry encourages the pilot. Short chainstays, a rather long front, a steering angle that is not too steep, these are all ingredients for a successful recipe. As mentioned, we like the suspension, of course the Fox 34 has less reserves at the front than a 36 would have, but overall you get a really good performance for the short travel. Only the brakes could have a little more power and, above all, a little more reserves. Several testers want to have found fading independently of each other. You're particularly pleased that the Maxxis Minion have such good grip, you can sometimes take the curve a little too quickly without panicking right away. The balanced geometry and the absorption capacity of the chassis surprised us and we really liked it. We experienced our "green miracle" in the Trance Advanced Pro 29.

The equipment is a bit behind other bikes in the test field. However, the price-performance ratio is very good, because you can get two Trance for the price of some competitors. We are not only satisfied with the installed parts based on the price. Everything does what it should, everything is coherent. The parts of the house brand, eg saddle, telescopic support, grips and wheels work well, look good and have been convincing us again and again for years. We also like the Sram Eagle groupset, as do the tires. For enduro riders, a heavier fork would be a good thing, but the 34 fits well with a great all-rounder. Perhaps an upgrade or change to the rear shock could improve uphill and flat performance. For the brakes, we would like at least large discs.