The brakes on your bike is like your life insurance, especially after you climb mountains and then have to come down at speed that could reach 100 km/h (~62 mph). You will really cross your fingers and hope that your brakes won't give up ... otherwise you'd be part of the landscape! This is one of the top reasons to have good maintenance for your bike. If you can't do it yourself, it would be a big mistake to save a few bucks and not sending your bike to professionals for regular services.
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If you take a close look at the brake levers, you'll see another set of levers right behind the brake levers. Those are part of the derailleurs levers that will allow you to shift gears, and they are usually not available with low-end derailleurs. The low-end ones require you to use your thumb and most likely to reposition your hand away from your brake lever to shift gears. This situation is not desirable when you are going downhill at high speed.
