Weekend swing dredge job taught me why we keep the old timer around

I ran a swing assignment near Baton Rouge last month where the sand was packed tighter than I've ever seen. Everyone said to bump the cutter RPMs and power through, so I did that for about four hours and got maybe 30 yards of progress. Then I slowed everything down, let the ladder settle, and used short passes like the senior guy on our crew always yells about. Turns out the 'slow is fast' approach cleared 120 yards by late Sunday, and my wear parts looked barely touched. Why do we keep pushing machines past their sweet spot when the numbers prove easing off works better? Has anyone else found that ignoring the speed-up advice actually saves the shift?