Cylinder gasket & HP

In the hot rod world almost everyone knows that cooler intake air = horsepower.

The cylinder base gasket on a Ryobi acts as a heat dam between the muffler and carb. Generally the engine is run inverted and heat rises, which makes matters worse.

Admittedly the gasket looks sort of tacky. Has anyone experimented with either leaving the gasket as is or building a more sophisticated heat dam?