I am going to fit new springs and droplinks to MY00
Is it worth putting a front strut brace in at the same time

You can fit it in 5 minutes yourself. It's as easy as undoing 3 12mm(iirc) bolts on either strut tops, put the brace on, and use the same bolts and tighten them... it doesn't do much to the handling, though, unless you are pushing it. Looks nice under the bonnet, but a pain in the arse when you want to work around turbo or intercooler.