I pull when standing to give the muscles that have been pushing a break. It seems to work but it does speed me up even though I'm not necessarily trying to go faster so I end up using more energy. I think it's something that takes training to be able to sustain. Kind of like training to maintain high cadences.

I'm still new to all these techniques so I'm not sure if I'm doing it right because I have to usually change about 4 or 5 gears up in order to make it hard enough to effectively pull up instead of push down. If I'm in my 30/27 gear, it's to easy to try to pull up, I have to be in 30/17 or even switch to the big chain ring after shifting 3 gears up.

I've heard about changing one gear up to stand but changing one gear doesn't allow a slow enough cadence to use my pull-up muscles.. not sure..?