eggplantwalking,
Whilst you quote some figures from the P51 Dash One manual that are correct, I disagree with most of what you say. As treadigraph has said, the Packard Merlin in a P51 has an injected carburetor that does not cut under negative g. I do not know the weight of the canopy but I am sure that it is more than 40 lbs! The main problem that I have with what you have said is that it appears to me that you have no understanding of Human Factors whatsoever which is why you fail to understand this pilot's actions following an intermittent loss of engine power. At no stage from when the first engine cut occurred did he have the energy to glide back to the airfield. It has already been well covered by others that an intermittent loss of power is a very difficult situation to deal with and there is a certain amount of luck involved as to whether the actions that you choose are the best; only post incident analysis will indicate this and, hopefully, may then provide lessons learned to those who suffer a similar failure subsequently. So saying, no two failures are ever the same. There are some interesting discussion points related to whether or not the electric fuel pump was on or off plus the relative merits of opening the canopy versus jettisoning it. However, I would not criticize Mark for anything that he did and his late decision to raise the landing gear and land in the field to the east of the M11 is commendable and definitely the correct and valid action. For me, one of the most interesting HF aspects was his reaction to the ATC call regarding the landing gear. None of us know how we would have reacted when given that call in those circumstances and any criticism based on hindsight from an armchair is unlikely to be justifiable. Overall, I suspect that I may well have completed essentially the same actions that Mark did in the circumstances with which he was confronted.
What is the basis for my opinions above? I was in that formation, I had flown 'Miss Velma' at Flying Legends in 2016 and I have had a partial loss of power (mechanical, dropped valve rod) in a P51 when I had about the same hours on type and in heavy warbirds that Mark had.
Very happy to discuss this further but if anyone wishes to criticize the pilot's actions then they should/must justify their reasons.