A zoom is rapid inertia climb after a dive and assuredly Bob did not perform this maneuver. ANY plane would beat another starting from level flight. The contest was a straight hand signal "let's go upstairs" though I don't know from exactly what altitude it commenced.
This was probably a case of "initial climb rate" winning though Zemke told me the paddle blade could take them to 30,000 feet in 13 minutes instead of the 20 with the original prop.
The firepower consideration is paramount however. Those 8 guns each spit out about 13 rounds a second from a 750 RPM rate of fire for the M-2. That's 104 total rounds out there headed down range. If that doesn't sound like much consider a 2-3 second burst with 312 API fifties converging somewhere. Imagine that's double the rate of the P-51B/C.
Air combat has evolved with the Thunderbolt theorum in mind- firepower gets lots of rounds down range at a target with a short burst. Weapon technology gave us fewer guns (now just one gun) firing at higher RPM.
Pretty cool the way it's all culminated to one gun with a super high rate of fire.
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