Sitar you should upload youre revised track - id love to hear it.
I wouldnt be concerned about hoggin top spot - if anyone is concerned they can bump you back down later.
If a track is altered then obviously you feel its for the better and therefore worth a listen.
With regard to the length (8 bars trimmed off) i often feel this is the hardest thing of all to do. I quite often listen to the same loop over and over again - sometimes 8bras fot 10minutes or more slowly soaking up ythe rhythm and trying to determine how to progress - quite often a iscrap them but what the hell while i'm listening and lost in the loop life is good.
With other peoples music i'm afraid i dont have the same patience with all i listen to - (unless something particularly reaches out to me) thats why i try my best to be savage with the cutting knife later on in a tracks development. I try to discard as much fat as possible.
On a similar note i found 1 track (a musician from Prague) who unfortunately defeated me with just the length of his track - I would have gladly listened to it but unfortunately my limited life span prevented it - HIS TRACK WEIGHED IN AT 4 HOURS 38 MINUTES AND 8 SECONDS. my only thought after 3 mins of listening was Bacon - after 4mins 32 secs i appologized and dropped out.