Evidence has a hierarchy — your training plan should too

Most fitness advice is a mechanism dressed up as a result. A pathway exists in a petri dish, so a supplement “works.” A muscle activates harder on EMG, so an exercise is “superior.” Mechanisms are cheap. Outcomes are expensive.

I apply the same evidence hierarchy to training that I apply to client work: systematic reviews and meta-analyses first, well-run RCTs second, mechanistic speculation last — and anything that only exists as a mechanism gets labeled experimental, not adopted.

The result is a boring, effective routine: progressive overload, sufficient protein, adequate sleep, and one experiment at a time with a clear success criterion. Boring compounds.