Where are you getting a recovery time of a week from? I top almost all my autos (once), but I also have an hourly camera set up for time lapse, and with most plants I see a recovery time of barely two or three hours before they resume growth. Not a week, just a few hours.
Edit: Or do you mean something more like that it's best to top while the plants still have at least a week or so of veg growth remaining, so the side branches have time to benefit from topping and develop into new top growth sites before transitioning into flowering? That makes sense to me, but I wouldn't describe it as "recovery time".
I usually top around day 15-18, FWIW, once I have a clear shot above the fourth node. I haven't experimented with earlier/later cutting above a different node, but that's worked for me so I've stuck with it.