Gearing and shifting 4 speed at the track

Bottom line I didn't mind giving up a very small amount of et for a lot of driveability...
I agree. IF you had only changed the gear, you'd saw a small difference with your set up. But you did a massive change to the entire car.

I did a swap with a mild 360 I went from 4.30's down to 3.91's. My E.T. and MPH stayed exactly the same.