I'm loving the Spitfire techniques! I find that these things increase my confidence in 'free form' flying and understanding how the a/c responds, it is such a nice change from the endless series of highly standardised, routine manoeuvres I am making in training. Also it seems to me to be nice as a means of loosing height quickly while maintaining the flexibility of being flapless. And, as mentioned, I was previously finding it difficult to use aileron without tracking it with the rudder on cross-wind landings and takeoffs and playing with crossed controls and plenty of altitude has helped me to get over that.
Of course, I take all the points about not over complicating things and sticking to the manual. I guess it’s lucky that I have you lot to bounce these things off. Pre such forums and Youtube, I guess everyone's instructor was god, now they must be sick of being told 'that's not what this bloke on Youtube said' !!