Needle resilience

😊👍.

We all occasionally do something like that. Good equipment takes it in stride.

It is no more than 8 hours worth of stylus wear. Why would it be more? Better yet why didn't it cut it's way through the record?

I had a friend who did this and the turntable had been spinning for weeks. He was horrified and sent it into Steve at VAS for inspection. Steve pronounced the cartridge as A-OK, and as far as I know my buddy is still using that cart.

Lead out has "clean cut grooves" -less abrasive opposed to the squiggly grooves?

To your surprise, you should not be worried at all and just continue to play music.

Invest in a Q-Up tone arm lifter, or similar. I never have to worry about it.

+1 on a tonearm lifter. I too have one on each arm - wouldn't live without it.

Heck, I do that to get the edge off of new carts after setting them up for play as a little break in time. Enjoy the music