I make a point of staying seated when doing Endurance, Tempo or Threshold intervals - but is it okay to stand when doing VO2 Max intervals like 30:30’s? I presume standing for Anaerobic efforts is expected?
I do everything seated, it’s really awkward to stand and pedal in erg mode on the zwift ride for some reason.
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The only “expected” thing is that people should ride & train in ways that mirror their needs off the trainer. I stand and sit as I see fit with no specific restrictions or requirements. Standing is great for a pure booty break, but also to change up the loading on the muscles & body.
I do those higher intensity intervals mixed and with an eye towards how I’d do the same effort outside. That can be seated for many of them and I stand when I see the need. There is no specific goal here that must be adhered to related to body position.
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Unless you have a way to override the “gearing”, standing in pure ERG mode is a hassle. Assume typical seated cadence around 80-100 rpm, many people stand around 60-75 rpm. With a real bike on a trainer in ERG, I still shift up (small to big ring, or 3+ rear) to drop cadence while maintaining similar axle speed. Been doing this for ages and shared it in an article long ago.
But with a smart bike in ERG, I am not sure you can “shift” into a harder relative gear. So the old advice from TR and others was to slow your cadence, let the trainer adapt to the new axle speed and then stand. When ready to sit, you have to overcome the load to spin up again. It’s a pain and the reason I recommend shifting for standing in ERG.
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Yep. In TR, I stand or sit as as the mood strikes me, though I stand very little. Some other apps specify whether to stand or sit, and also give cadence targets that can include big changes between intervals. Like mcneese.chad, when I need to make a relatively big change in cadence, I’ll sometimes shift to keep the flywheel rpm about the same. In ERG mode, I’m in the small ring and middle of the cassette as ERG regulation and interval changes are better. To make a big drop in cadence from my typical 90 rpm, I’ll shift to the big ring, and maybe a smaller cog or two.
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Specificity, specificity, specificity. Ride & train in ways that mirror what you are training for.
For me, 30s/30s VO2Max intervals and Anaerobic intervals 15s-60s, are done at a power that I would normally ride seated outside and my trainer has no problem with the power jumps of 400w in Erg mode.
I only really stand for all out sprint efforts like I would outside, and then I put my trainer in slope/level mode and change gear to get the correct resistance.
But if you are the type of rider that rides out of the saddle a lot, counterintuitively you should change into a harder gear to avoid ERG spiral of doom
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For the longer aerobic intervals I stay seated but I’ll stand for like 30-60s at a time for comfort and variety.
For VO2s I stay seated the whole time. Mostly because I can pedal at a higher cadence and because the point isn’t to push out the most watts but to demand the most oxygen so standing and using either bigger motor units or different muscles to push out more watts anaerobically doesn’t achieve that goal. But I’ll definitely stand in between.
For something like 30/30s I’ll usually stay seated. It’s more race specific for me
For true anaerobic efforts like a 30 or 60s I sit and stand as much is required which is usually like 20ish seconds standing, 25s sitting, then 10-15s standing to squeeze out the last drops.
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Odds are pretty good you’re going to be able to sustain better power for 30s by sitting. Why not stand to get the inertia going and then sit?
There’s no “expectation”, just do max watts for 30s, then rest for 30s, repeat.
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I’ll try to do most things seated but sometimes to get things going you just need to stand up to get things turning before sitting down again. At least that’s what I try to do sometimes I think on short VO2max stuff I’ll get carried away and keep on sprinting (standing) until the end.
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@kurt.braeckel - we must deliver power very differently as I can put much more power out standing for 30 seconds than sitting.
Thanks for all the replies.
Sounds like the consensus is to mainly sit - but not to be worried about standing when it feels appropriate (unless workout instructions state otherwise)
Then that’s something you should train and work on. 
Most everyone can generate more torque standing, but if you’re still standing at 30s and still accelerating (on a flat road), then you need to be in a smaller gear and spin your legs faster because you’re bleeding speed and the group has left you behind by the time you get up to speed. What cadence are you doing these 30s intervals at?
For 30s interval repeats, if you’re standing through all of them because there’s a marked performance difference, then you should train your ability to generate torque and leg speed while seated in my opinion.
I agree with part of what you are saying. I should (and do) train my ability to generate torque and leg speed while seated, not least because it is more aero (in the real world).
However why restrict the anaysis to flat roads? Quite a few race finishes I do are on inclines and I can kick out more power standing for 30 seconds or longer, than I could seated. Most people I race with would also be standing. I think this is also true on the flat, but less so.
I didn’t “restrict” it. I “qualified” it. If you’re on an incline for your 30/30s, then you likely need to generate more torque and thus standing makes sense. If you’re doing 30/30s on a flat road or trainer, and still need to stand for all or most of the interval to generate power, then something is off.
The conversation about finishing on a single 30s incline is quite a bit different than doing 30/30 repeats.