Originally Posted by fredswain

A shock that is layed down has less leverage than one that is stood up. That effectively lowers the spring rate. The orientation of a shock has nothing to do with whether it has more grip or less grip or corners better or soaks up bumps better, etc. The exact same is true for the lower shock mount location but in addition to changing the effective spring rate (wheel rate), it also effectively changes dampening. With the wide selection of springs, pistons, and oils that we have today, we could honestly have only 1 shock mounting option and could tune it for any situation.