skeem

ive been riding road bikes seriously for about 3 years now. ive recently started to race for my school team and im doing ok. but ive noticed that my saddle to handlebar drop is much less than most of the guys, and i love riding in the drops, so i figured maybe i should lower my stem a spacer or two. i flipped my stem down last week and since then ive been doing much better in my races (probably a coincidence?). ive noticed that all the good A class riders have pretty horizontal backs in the drops, and i know i dont. i was wondering if someone thinks itd be a good idea to lower my stem by maybe like a 2mm spacer, and how low can/should i go? does anyone know a site that might have popper stats for this stuff? i have 2 weeks off until my next races and im going to be training, but i kinda wanna tinker and hopefully get a bit more power and cornering ability. any advice would be greatly appreciated. i do mostly crits and circuit races so getting max power and good cornering (lower center of gravity) is key. my races rarely last more than an hour, so i wanna get the max out during that short time.
--thanks

Val23708

saddle to bar drop depends on your physiology. its mostly about hip angle - don't have your knees hitting your chest when in aero. you can also bend your elbows more to get more drop. you probably won't get more power btw. cornering depends on all points where your body is connected to your bike

umd

If you try to increase your drop too quickly you will likely lose power and be uncomfortable. A "flat back" is the ideal but I'd say that most, especially in the lower cats, don't get anywhere near it.

caloso

Bend your elbows before you start tinkering with your bike.

DaveSSS 

Keep in mind that lowering the bars either by flipping a stem or removing spacers also moves the bars forward by about 3mm for each 10mm that the bars are lowered, so you are also increasing your reach. Make small changes from here on, since you already made a big change by flipping the stem.