No, just worked out that they could pull the power back and coarsen the prop settings to run the engines at lower RPM - a bit like running a car in a very high gear. The pilots thought they'd damage the engines, but Lindberg said not, and to proove it he'd fly with them.
He did. It worked, vastly increasing range. Lindy potted a 'kill', then the big cheeses thought about the adverse publicity if he got shot down so that was the end of his combat career.
SSD