Thread's a little stale by now, but thought I'd throw out an update since I just got a Trail Carbon, in case anyone was still curious. Agree with DarKris - I was definitely thinking of this as an Open U.P. minus the extra $10K. I wish the Trail had a racier geometry to match the U.P., as I generally prefer, but I don't find the Trail at all sluggish. Couple impressions from the first couple weeks with it (mostly road riding, some gravel):
-it may run a little small, but I don't think it's too severe. I normally ride a 54 road, and got a 53 Trail so I could run a more aggressive setup. It fits great (and I'm glad I did since the headtube is sooo tall!!)
-it's a little heavy stock (~22lbs). Definitely throwing a carbon seatpost on when I swap to my preferred saddle. Might think about upgrading the crank, but no problems with performance on the stock Sram rival one. Not going carbon bars or stem since I'm going to use it for CX too. The flared shallow drop bars are awesome.
-Love the shifting - can't even tell that it's a long cage rear der (haven't had one before, and heard it was a little more sluggish). May be a problem on a muddy cx course, but it's great to have the 32 in the back around Seattle.
-the HED's and G-Ones are great, surprisingly fast rolling on the road for being so huge. I'm only about 5min slower on this over my normal roaddie on my 90min ride (at cruise pace).
-LOVE the through axles. Super solid feel running on the bike up hill or into a turn (and the hydro brakes are awesome for the corners as well).
-finally, love the practicality of the rack and fender eyelits. It even has 3rd bottle bosses on the bottom of the downtube. That's worth the slight weight penalty of an all out cx bike if you plan to foray into the fireroad scene, in my opinion.

Any other questions, feel free to lob 'em my way. Cheers