You can use a robots file or a meta tag:
<META NAME=”ROBOTS” CONTENT=”NOINDEX, NOFOLLOW”>
Additionally, I forgot to mention, I changed to default links versus rewrite to see if the issue was in the redirect, and the same occurs.
HTaccess is limited to the rewrite rules for WP and auth lockdown.
I added the plugin you listed and it hangs equally as long before redirecting to the page.
On occasion it will redirect back to the post very quickly, giving me false hope that I’ve somehow pushed the right button to get it to work correctly 🙂 Only to have my hopes destroyed.