Dang it, you're right. My first thought was that the amount of energy expended in generating a large centripetal force should transfer to distance gained when I pull on the rope after I let it go, but instead, after you let it go, you traveled in the opposite direction at a proportional speed...
Recently, I've been watching a lot of those youtube videos debunking gyroscopic propulsion because everything about it violates the second law of motion or something...
This got me thinking, if I was floating in space and I decided to swing a large rock on a rope around me, to generate some...