This week Plants 1 and 2 have been growing well and are about at the same stage of growth. I'm hoping next week they really start to take off. Plant 3 and 4 have had a rough start, they're both just now braking through the soil which are putting them about 2 weeks behind in growth from plants 1 and 2. hopefully they can catch up pretty fast in the next few weeks so I can start topping them at least a week before I put them in bloom.
Based on this experiment, In the future, I'm definitely going to at least put the seeds in water for 24 hours before I plant them in soil. The time saved by doing a 24 hour soak to help the plant get started is definitely worth the time saved and very little effort to do.
In the next few weeks I'm planning to do a tutorial on topping as well as a tutorial on training your plant and defoliation.