Thanks for the replies gents - you're right, the 12.8 seconds were in fact likely on the up-shift or below the cutoff - only the 1.1 seconds likely due to downshift were spent above the cutoff over 2 separate sub 1 second events. They occurred more than 220 hours before i lost 3rd gear.
Also, the last time i went above 7200 was 54 hours before the fault.
That, and the longevity of my previous cars despite hard driving make me doubt that those two early events are to blame.
In other words i would love to know for sure. These days 350 hp is not that much, and the car is rather light - high performance cannot be used as an excuse and engineering tolerances should be higher especially for a car meant to double as a road and track vehicle with the price and reputation of a Porsche. If this model were a pure race car, then i would understand 1.1 seconds over two events slowly sending it to Valhalla. We should all have Edd China as a close personal friend.
These companies have become so large and impersonal and out of touch with their own immense driving heritage. On that note, i recently watched "The 24 Hour War" telling the story of the Ferrari-Ford LeMans rivalry in the 60's. Highly recommend it.
@photonscience - I'm glad that you managed to get them to replace it, but these companies should address this resistance to help their customers and should do a better job of identifying drive-train abuse. As for Audi, my Dad had a crack in a cylinder in his 2.0T A4 and the car was just out of warranty. Audi recognized that this should not have happened and replaced the whole engine at no cost - they did however resist at first.