With a dropper seatpost to Milan-San Remo victory: The plan worked!

Seatposts that can be lowered at the touch of a button have become an integral part of full-suspension mountain bikes and e-mountain bikes, but it was a first for road bikes. Matej Mohorič was ridiculed by the competition. "That's no good," he was told. But on the descent, he got away with the help of the low riding position. "It was a plan that we had been pursuing all winter," Mohorič told the press conference. The plan: Milan-San Remo to win in the descent from the Poggio - with the help of a lowerable seat post, as known from mountain bikes. Sitting lower means an extreme aero advantage at high speeds, and the centre of gravity is lower, allowing better bike control. Mohorič was still a few metres behind the four-man leading group around the top favourites Wout Van Aert and Tadej Pogačar at the top of the Poggio. Mohorič then operated the twist grip in the handlebar arch and the standard Fox Transfer SL seatpost sank six centimetres lower into the seat tube due to his weight. Shortly afterwards, he stormed past the leaders and away towards the finish line.

What are the benefits of a dropper seatpost on a road bike?

An aero advantage of up to 50 watts can be expected at speeds of around 60 km/h. This compensates for the disadvantage that a seatpost with a round tube cannot be fixed in the frames of many modern aero racing bikes and Mohorič therefore had to use the less streamlined model from his bike supplier. The Slovenian normally rides the Aero road bike "Reacto" from Merida and switched to the tyre for Milan-San Remo. All-round racing bike "Scultura". This has a round seatpost with a diameter of 27.2 millimetres, which made it possible to install the Vario seatpost in the first place.

Is that in accordance with the rules?

After Mohorič's victory, questions arose as to whether the use of the dropper post was legal. The UCI confirmed this: "The UCI Equipment Commission authorised the use of dropper posts in road cycling races in 2014." The statement also refers to article 1.3.013 of the UCI regulations according to which the apex of the saddle must be at least five centimetres behind a vertical plane passing through the bottom bracket axle. "This means that if the seatpost is set to the highest or lowest setting, the saddle must be set in full compliance with Article 1.3.013," explains the UCI. This was the case for Mohorič, which is why his use of the lowerable seatpost was permitted.

A comment from the TOUR technology editorial team

TOUR technical editor Jens Klötzer wrote a commentary on Mohorič's victory with a dropper seatpost. The dropper post was also discussed in detail in the "Klingeln bei Klötzer" section of the Antritt podcast.

Rule? What rule?

Matej Mohorič's victory at the Milan-San Remo cycling monument could be the next shockwave for traditional racing cyclists. While some are still digesting the latest changes to disc brakes, tubeless tyres and full integration, the heads of bike manufacturers are probably already smoking again. Dropper seat posts could be the next hot thing on road bikes. Behind the scenes, the competition to see who will be the quickest to present the first race bike with an integrated dropper post as standard has long since broken out. Very innovative manufacturers will already be thinking about how they can technically harmonise the racing office chair with the painstakingly marketed performance of their aero bikes.

Unfortunately, the consequence of this event will be that all riders, teams and manufacturers will have to follow suit. New frames and new standards will be developed at full speed, high-end bikes will become 200 grams heavier, more complex and (at least) 500 euros more expensive. Later on, the wave will reach less expensive models, and ultimately a competition road bike without a dropper seat post will eventually be unsaleable because it will look as outdated as one with rim brakes today. Some cyclists are likely to give up their favourite hobby because they can no longer keep up with technical developments - whether for financial or purely pragmatic reasons.

You can't blame Mohorič, his team or his advisors for that. It is legitimate to pull out all the technical stops to win such an important race, as long as they are legal. And they are, as long as they are not explicitly banned, like the dropper post. You could say that the really disastrous thing about the cascade is that Mohorič actually won. If he had only come second, the experiment would probably have gone down as a curious side note in the technical history of cycling. But thanks to his victory and his crystal-clear advantage in the decisive race situation, the experiment became a "must-have" within just one kilometre of an Italian coastal road. No professional, no team and no supplier wants to go into the next race at a competitive disadvantage if a descent could be decisive for the race.

The only institution that could have put the brakes on this development is the UCI. The past provides plenty of examples where the world cycling organisation has used its authority to interpret what a racing bike should look like in the interests of the consumer: active suspension at Paris-Roubaix, strange frame shapes on time trial bikes or aerodynamic fairings - many innovations that were not (yet) covered by the regulations were taken down by the technical commission shortly after they popped up as being against the rules. All the more so when they offered an obvious competitive advantage. Rules were also changed, clarified or newly created afterwards. As a result, the UCI was often pilloried as a brake on progress. However, it also prevented the racing bike from becoming a highly bred, expensive specialised machine with which an amateur rider can hardly do anything.

In the meantime, the UCI's mindset has changed. They want to "make the most of the advantages that technical evolution brings to cycling", as it says on the UCI website today. The federation's (pre-)quick approval of the clip-on brace, via Twitter just a few hours after Mohorič's cheer at the finish, was probably intended to emphasise this. But is this also good for the general development of cycling? They should have at least thought a little longer about the consequences. In any case, this decision is not compatible with the most important requirements of the UCI Charter, namely to keep the barriers to entry into cycling low, to guarantee equal opportunities across all performance categories and to act as sustainably as possible at all levels.