Low stress training

If you can safely bend it you can safely train it as far as I’m concerned.

if you can avoid removing a leaf, do so... only take it off if it's going to cause microbial growth (resting directly on another leaf) o if it is touching the ground... have a good reason to remove it. photosynthesis technically occurs in any green material on the plant, but only in leaves do you find high concentration of chlorophyll and only in the top layers. anywhere else will be a significantly reduced ability to produce ATP through photosynthesis. people often mistakenly believe light hitting buds improves their quality.. but in reality it's light hitting leaves near those buds that help significantly more. Due to the fact height from canopy and intensity of light is ruled by inverse square law, you also get far less light hitting those areas than just a few inches above... so it's probably not going to cause a larger yield trying to maximize light to lower areas... doing so with less opportunity cost is a great idea though.

are the stems too rigid to bend without snapping? then, you can still LST. It breaks apical dominance. Tallest gowth node will take the most resources in the plant. cause and effect... one gets too tall, you reduce it's heigh temporarily.. in addition to creating a level base for growth and any other reason to do it. With autos, it's best to know the timing of the strain... you don't want to create a bunch of lower limbs that never grow out enough etc... so maybe shoot for 6-8 primary colas... longer vege autos you can go for a more substantial plant. Learn when to let the terminal growth tip grow vertically again to catch up to the rest etc... the more level it is, the more evenly the buds will develop... more top colas / less larf.. will probably be a similar yield in many cases, but proportion of quality nuges will improve, i'd wager.

Do you recommend plucking some of those bigger fan leaves off or not bother and just pull them out the way? Thanks for the help also 🙌

Never too late imho.... in fact, I've had to LST an autoflower grow all the way through to two weeks before harvest... had to keep her away from the lights as she was so very tall... Just pull those branches out away from the main stem - she'll take on a more "Christmas Tree" shape which is just fine... but that will get the bud sites out away and getting more light which is the whole point of LST.. Good luck!