Yes, retarding the timing will help it start, but as mentioned it is starter heat soak. High compression engines with weak starters, poor connections, old cables, or marginal batteries will often exhibit this.

You can buy better starter solenoids (abt. $30) or a good starter (abt. $200) or just wait a while for it to cool. Heat wrap for the starter seems like a bad idea, but the metal heat shields that leave an air gap work okay.