I was thinking of the weight stopping and starting with each stroke in the 8, especially big blocks. Our stuff is usually bigger and heavier inside and really wasn't designed to spin that high that long. Which is at least part of the reason why anything but a performance car got 2.76s or so. Of course, newer, lighter reciprocating assemblies lessen the impact.

And doesn't the load increase exponentially with RPM?

I just think that after a certain point, the higher the RPM and the longer it is held there, the more impact it has on our engines. So I don't cruise my big blocks over 3,500 for any length of time and usually try to keep it closer to 3,000.

Too old school?