Every bit is true and correct. I realized that my instructor was being overprotective during training and had to ask him to ignore me the best he could. Having been a prof teaching surgery, I realize how hard that was for him to do--been there--but he had to do it. Nearly killed him, but it dramatically improved my skill set.
And it didn't actually kill him.
Not sure mr. mootin understood the article: it wasn't permission to be stupid, it was pointing out what constitutes being stupid.
I don't disagree with his advice, though: do it right, or do something else.
Answer to tomusa1: losing altitude/airspeed requires much less thought about energy management than does adding it. To descend, throttle back, pitch for airspeed, add flaps as necessary. To climb, in theory do the reverse. But what settings do you need to climb at that rate on that day? Yes, you can calculate it, but it's kinda obvious that it's a lot thornier problem to solve in realtime.
In my DA 40, a climb might or might not happen at an assigned rate, especially at altitude. Descent? No problem.
