Observation question.
Seems all the Scott Sram mens racers run the custom low slung stems.
What’s everyone’s thoughts on this?
If you look at Nino, his saddle to bar drop doesn’t look that dramatic. Almost like the actual stem is shorter because of the 35degree drop.
Could he run a smaller frame? Or does he run the medium for the wheelbase and gets lower with the stem?
Hump
I know in Nino’s case one of the reasons he stayed off 29ers for a long time was he couldn’t get the bars low enough for the position he likes due to the higher front end needed by the larger wheel. The custom stems were Scott’s solution to that.
Not 100% sure on the race teams reasons but for me it allowed me to run a larger frame for better stability but get the bar at the height I wanted.
A larger bike is so much faster descending to me and offers a lot more control.
I am in process of building a year round XC fat race bike.
I’ve got a feeling this could also be the reason the team runs them
Hump
That was pre-2016 on the older versions of the Spark.
The last two iterations of the Spark were already designed with that into account. That said, most of the XCO pros (Nino included) still run low front-ends for better climbing.
To bump up this thread, I’ve been looking around social media, and it appears that most people riding the new Scott bikes has these lower than usual stems.
Hump
