Can confirm its not fun to do downhill pavées. However I can not talk about doing them coming into them at 55 km/h, but I would assume its more more nice to go into them at 25 km/h. Shits scary as ***, but then again, Im kind of a pussy and enjoy riding Koppenberg much more than a regular pavé. After doing Flanders, I came to the the conclusion that the Roubaix sportive is by far the race I wanna do the least out of any of the available races. I got railed on those parts and only did 3-4 pavées, but the worst were by far the ones starting out 2-4% downhill. Thats just straight up devils work honestly. Give me 10-12% any day of the week, even when fat Belgian, frit-eating and bear drinking guys are clogging up the climb and forcing everyone to walk. Still much better than a god damn downhill pavé. Thats just made to injure people and I could not imagine doing them at those speeds that they do. This will help a bit, thats for sure.
I personally like the change.
Edit: MVP for the win, but this one should be closer. I really do not hope Philippsen is winning though, guy decided to not show up for Flanders after Mathieu gifting him MSR and doing leadouts the whole Tour last year. Phillipsen could have helped their mediocre squad, even though he's not perfect for Flanders. But at least try to give something back to a champion thats putting aside his own ambitions for your sake. Pathetic display by Phillipsen honestly, on par with Quick Steps classics campaign!