Racers used to use heating pads/bags whatever to get the batteries hot to drop IR's. That got banned as Im sure it caused some fires. Then they started discharging and charging at high rates. I think its even better than heaters, as it heats the battery internally. Heaters need to hold the battery at 100-120deg so heat gets into the core of the battery. But with discharging/charging it heats from the inside out. So instead of keeping a battery at high temps for 30-60min or however long, you just cycle once or twice before your race. High temps can be just as damaging as high amps, possibly more.

Lipos have been getting more resistant to racer abuse as they've developed and the current gen stuff seems pretty awesome as far as that goes. I have batteries that are a year old that had most of their life cycling at 40amps and lived just fine and IR's are barely starting to degrade. Lipos from 3 years ago wouldn't hold up this well.

Racers will always look for every bit of power and advantage they can. Pushing boundaries are part of racing. If someone is cycling their stuff, at this point its not really a safety issue. Honestly if it gets banned, then you'll get stuck buying more expensive packs that naturally have low IRs. Like Trinity/Reedy/Fantoms vs buying budget packs and cycling them. Or like this post, might start heating the batteries. Honestly I think thats even more dangerous. So pick your poison!