[QUOTE=DDH] and one guy road up beside me and started telling me that when I climbed the hills to stay in the higher gear and stand and pump.
Now it seems more effcient to do this because you peddle a few pumps, stop and then peddle a few and stop and so on and so on. He told me that I would get in shape faster and be able to do the hills better doing this.

QUOTE]

Here's my 2 cents worth

I have been riding pretty steady since this spring and am more comfortable on my bike and with distance riding. Also my legs are stronger now so I can do this

I have just figured out when standing up to take hills is worthwhile.
Normally I shift way down and pedal at as high a cadence as possible (sometimes even in the lowest granny I am not going too fast) most hills around here are long (1/2 - 1 mile and from 8-10 grade AND we have no run at them -ie a downhill leading into them.

Last week on the tour I was on we got into some rollers (up, down, up, down etc) we could get enough speed on the downhill to get almost 1/2 way up the next before shifting down, we would shift down a little, stand up and top the hill off, - the only reason you need to stay in a little higher gear (not a high gear) is to keep the pedal pressure even, the minute I sat down I shifted down. I found this actually conserved energy in the long run in this instance - it did take a little bravery to take the down hills at 25 -35 mph

There is no way I would try this on a long hill, my granny gear is fine for my legs and knees and I do get to the top eventually.
(one of my riding partners stands up some even on longer hills because she is on a smaller bike and thinks she couldn't keep up if she didn't) When the day gets long though she sits down for them all too.

On short and I mean short inclines I will stand up for a few pedal strokes just to avoid shifting down or losing my cadence for a mere 10 yards (we have short rises where there are intersections on the bike path)