im actually surprised at that as the extra upload is gained from a shift in the frequency split, meaning downstream has less available bandwidth regardless of line length - ive heard that 24,000k is just a set limit, ive seen adsl2+ sync rates of 27,000k so this must be related, such a good SNR on a really short line must still provide enough bits over the available ANNEX-M range of tones to provide a 24k sync still.