Dunno. Like many, my first bikes were your typical kid's single speed banana seat bikes. And I rode the hell out of them. But it was a flat area. Later, my mom got me a 10 speed, but hills hadn't really magically developed and so I just went faster.

Then I moved to Austin. There's hills here, but then I got my license and didn't ride much.

Riding more seriously came just a few years ago, and I've always had geared bikes for that, and I've taken advantage of the gears. Perhaps I used to stand on the pedals, but if so, I've totally forgotten. I've just been spinning up hills. It works, as long as I pace myself appropriately -- but steep hills make even that difficult.

I use clipless pedals already, and I think my form is reasonable, but I'll see if I can pay more attention to that.

Nermel, you felt like you'd go over the bars when you stand? Hmm, that makes sense. Sometimes while I'm sprinting up a really steep (but probably short) hill, it feels like I'm going to flip over backwards. But this is me sitting and spinning -- I guess standing might reduce that then.