I ran aluminum rods for year too. I still would today if I was racing.
Regardless of rod materiel I don’t care to slow the car down using the engine as a brake. Probably because I always run a stick I always push in the clutch while getting on the binders or get it neutral.
I won’t use a RVB without a clean neutral because there is no way to go from high gear to neutral without going back through 2 and 1 to get there. With a conventional shift pattern I go right to neutral at the end of a run.