Anyone know anything about disc brakes?

if it was a CX bike for racing, I wouldn't want to have to get off and adjust the pads in a race.

You don't have to. The stock pads are resilient, and an inline barrel adjuster can be used if things start to go really wrong. I've found that if you are racing in conditions that trash brakes super quick you usually have bigger problems to worry about :)

I would not use them to descend Monte Zoncolan

I thought that...but good, fresh dot fluid doesn't expand with heat. So they should be fine.