Will have to see if I can get away to take a ride as I think he's working weekends.
Apart from bigger bars, etc. he also has an R which is heavier.
He's used the same rates as for GTI so in essence he has gone softer than recommended, although the bars wil make up for it.
I've been emailing cross re: rates and damper range and though you can go softer, they don't recommend it (well not too much). Despite the email recommendation from the techo at the other end, i'm not sure aussie roads are necessarily up to US spec for the standard ride.
In any case, I think the other reason might be shorter travel in the setup, which if made softer allows more droop thus reducing suspension travel. No good having freedom of height adjustability if you still have much less travel even at stock height.
So catch 22 - make it too soft and you lose too much travel (defeating one of the advantages of Cross in the first place), too firm and you lose ride comfort but get full travel.
Otherwise, if you wanted to come back a lot closer to stock, it'd be custom rates + custom dampers and it'd work out cheaper and simpler to just go with SHS, although you'd lose on the camber plate and adjustable shocks.
At least Cross has more damper adjustability than PSS10 (15 vs 10 clicks) and you can (yet to fully confirm) get rates close to PSS10. Not yet sure on travel.