There’s nothing quite like the satisfaction of a first ride on a bike you’ve built yourself.

Every detail sweated over, choosing the right frame as a starting point then picking the best components for your style of riding, placing the orders and then, when you’re surrounded by piles of boxes, putting the bike together piece by piece.

If you’ve never built your own bike before, you really should, it’s an invaluable experience in gaining first-hand experience of how the components blend together as a whole, the relationship between the separate parts. And knowing that your own fair hands have built the bike, tightened every bolt, is one of the most satisfying experiences in mountain biking.

Granted it’s far easier to waltz into a bike shop, slap down your credit card on the counter and walk out with a ready built bike that’s good to go. But sometimes the urge to build something unique, with your own hands, starts to nag at the back of your mind.

That happens to me every couple of years. I get the itch from time to time. I’ve built up plenty of bikes over the years, but it’s been a while since I built my last, Project Pipedream, several years ago. So when Upgrade Bikes asked if I wanted to test the new Kinesis XCPro3, I pleaded with them to send me a frame, telling thema I’ll look after the rest. Happily they (perhaps begrudgingly) obliged.

So here it is, freshly built up, looking resplendent in the summer sunshine ready for some abuse. The XCPro3 frame I’ve plumped for makes a great starting point for somebody wanting to build a traditional aluminium race-focused hardtail. It’s about as light as frames made from the material get and looks thoroughly modern with its Superplastic Formed downtube, a masculine square shaped affair. Details include a carbon wishbone seat stay assembly which boosts stiffness and response out on the trail, and neat cable routing, hydroformed chainstays and tidy dropouts.

Having decided I wanted to build up a reasonably light hardtail for a spot of XC racing then, I decided to go light on the components too. Not silly light, I’m no weight weenie (as I alluded to in this recent article on the subject of bike weight), but not heavy and durable; it’s got to last and stand up to some punishment and a long maintenance intervals afterall.

So a shiny Shimano XTR groupset has gone on, in 2×10 guise it is light but still offers a good spread of gears for UK trail riding and racing. Though not everyone will agree, I reckon it’s the best looking groupset Shimano has ever produced. Almost too nice to get dirty and gritty.

Continuing the XTR theme is an old pair of XTR wheels that have stood up well to many hours of abuse over the years, and despite never having been serviced or seen a spoke key, are still true. The wheels are wrapped with Bontrager’s razor quick XR1 Team Issue tyres. They’re naughty fast.

Into the head tube we’ve fitted a Magura MD120M fork, which incidentally nicely matches the white and red colour scheme of the frame. No I didn’t plan it. They pack 120mm of travel from an air spring and feature a lockout lever and adjustable rebound. It weighs 3.26lb (1.48kg), and the unique Dual Arch Design (DND) makes them one of the stiffest forks around.

Keeping the weight down is the box of lightweight components from KCNC that arrived recently. So on goes the Flyride stem, scandium Bone riser bar and matching Pro Lite-9000 seatpost. Nice. A new WTB Valcon saddle and some black lock-on grips complete the package.

Looks good in the flesh, I think, and on first impressions it absolutely rips along. I’ll report back on how it all rides very soon