Another professional interloper into the BM virtual bike shed. This is the 2007 race bike of Giant’s Oli Beckingsale, upon which he’ll be contesting the World Championships at Fort William later in the year.

The heart of the bike is the Giant Anthem Advanced all-carbon fibre 90mm travel full suspension frame. Giant’s engineers had whittled so much out of the aluminium Anthem that even a switch to carbon fibre only yielded a weight saving of 150g or so, but the resulting frame is a bunch stiffer at the front end – we’ve ridden one and it feels like a completely different bike.

The majority of the running gear comes from various stalls in the SRAM stable. Truvativ Noir cranks, SRAM X.0 transmission and Avid Ultimate brakes all have a place here, while a RockShox Reba World Cup holds the front end up. It’s got a very smart remote lockout lever in the style of the X.0 trigger shifter, but Oli’s waiting for the Matchmaker combined brake/shifter bar clamp to tidy up the controls a bit. Nothing unusual about the pedals – good old Shimano SPDs here.

A USE carbon Sumo post holds a Selle Italia SLR saddle, while a Truvativ stem grips an unbranded (actually it is branded, but the logos are taped over) bar. Oli’s running a low riser bar at the moment, but plans to switch to a heavily-swept flat bar and bar ends.

The missing magic ingredient is the wheels. Oli’s been running the Stan’s NoTubes system for several years, and the NoTubes rims for a few. For 2007 he’ll be running the latest ultralightweight NoTubes rims and a pair of White Industries hubs, a wheel package that apparently comes in at 1,350g a pair.

One thing’s for sure, with all this tech Oli’s got no excuse…