My MK 2 Punto Sporting for the last few weeks has from time to time
felt quite stiff to push down.

The problem comes and goes.

But It seems to occur more on really cold days. It's like you can feel
a cable is try to pull something and there's a resistance and sometimes
you can hear a metal cable straining type noise.

Any idea what this could be? The car is 5 years old but only done
14,000 since I work from home don't drive it that much. Most of my
journeys are short start and stop town journeys.

Could such problems be caused by traditoinally being taught to also
change down through the gears to help slow down a car as well as using
the brakes?

I did some reading on the net and ssome sites suggest it's something
like a clutch bearing that might need replacing?