Various embodiments for writing received synchronized data to magnetic tape having a plurality of wraps using a magnetic tape drive adapted for performing the writing according to an available plurality of predefined tape speeds are provided. In one such embodiment, for each of the available plurality of predefined tape speeds, an average overhead per synchronized command for performing a recursively accumulated backhitchless flush (RABF) cycle is calculated. One of the available plurality of predefined tape speeds having a lowest calculated average overhead is selected. The RABF cycle is performed using the selected one of the available plurality of predefined tape speeds.