Originally Posted by
llanfairpg
'Shock cooling' more folk lore!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Tell that to the folks who use Lycoming powered glider tugs and they'll brain you!
Keeping power on to allow the rear cylinders to cool slowly makes a huge difference to the mean time between failures. Now, it may not be relevant of a relatively cool circuit, but it certainly does apply to engines which have warmed up nicely in a high power climb - just 20-30 seconds of so of level flight before pulling back the throttle and subjecting the cylinders to increased airflow in the descent can make all the difference to engine life.