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>>>>Except that I'm talking about coasting downhill, not downshifting uphill. If I need to slow down going downhill, I break. On level surfaces, depending on my speed, I'll often downshift to slow. By the way, why do 'slow down' and 'slow up' mean the same thing?
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>>>Wow. Coasting a vehicle with the clutch depressed at a high rate of speed is dangerous.
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>>But why? I have full control of the vehicle. The steering works and the brakes work. It's not as if I'm in free fall with no way to regulate the vehicle's speed or direction. In fact, in order to brake one has to depress the clutch or stall anyway and with the clutch already depressed, the brakes are a piece of cake. If I need to corner, I just slow down some. I can't see what the problem would be.
>
>Take a fun filled ride through Colorado that way one day... :o) You haven't lived til you've come down a real mountain in a 74 Triumph Spitfire with no clutch... :o)

Why am I not surprised that you have owned a Spitfire? ;-)

I remember those Colorado mountain roads with truck escape lanes on the steep descents.