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Originally Posted by soma
a stop
Are you supposed to always downshift one gear at a time, brake at each gear until you hit 2nd when you can then shift into neutral and come to a complete stop?
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no, you don't have to, and you can downshift more than 2 gears at a time. I routinely go from 5th to 2nd if I'm at highway speeds and need to stop quickly, because at 55mph I'm just at redline in 2nd gear. As you get more experience you'll learn how fast the engine will be turning at a given speed in a given gear, which will help you know when and how to downshift.
Unless you need to stop quickly, downshifting is not the best idea unless you've learned how to double clutch, because while downshifting does save wear on your brake pads, it wears out the synchros in the transmission faster, and brake pads are a lot cheaper than synchros.
If you double clutch correctly then you're not damaging the synchros and you can downshift all you want.