it's not essential you convert to subdiv at all. You can smooth the model under the polygons/mesh menu.You can also use a poly proxy mesh as a reference to what the final smoothed mesh will look,Kurt uses subd in his workflow because he likes the extra control you can get when tweeking but if you prefer to tweek just in poly then thats your perrogative.
The bottom line is whatever works for you is ok.
Modeling can be done entirely in Nurbs, polygons or sub division surfaces or any combination of these there are no rules as long as you end up with what you need to make.
Last edited by jsprogg; 12-04-2007 at 06:05 PM.