In our last post on daily planning, we created the skeleton for a workout.

Now we must understand the importance of creating a hierarchy that will help you make appropriate exercise selections. Nearly all of the hundreds of exercises and movements that exist have a potential benefit. It is impossible to fit every beneficial exercise into a workout, weekly plan, or even a monthly plan. Therefore it is important to prioritize your exercises based on their ability to help you reach your training goals. Below we will outline a sample hierarchy of resistance training exercises and demonstrate how this can help you to train efficiently. hen setting up a hierarchy for exercise selection it is important divide movements into categories to ensure you end up with a balanced training plan. ithout categorizing movements, it is easy to assemble a workout of redundant exercises that provide similar stresses to the body. !nless you aspire to be a bodybuilder and train without any real performance goals, it is not advisable to perform multiple movements with very similar stressors in the same workout. If you did not stress your body enough in the first movement, you may need to rethink your volume and intensity parameters. In our example we have categorized the movements into both pushing and pulling motions, as well upper and lower body dominances. This is "ust one of many ways to arrange your hierarchy. #ther examples include power or ballistic movements, strength, and therapeutic or corrective movements. Based on your goals and categorization method, you must now prioritize exercises in each category. $rioritization should be governed by identifying exercises that best answers the following three %uestions& '( )oes the movement involve multiple muscle groups working together as a system* +( )oes the movement allow us to utilize heavy loads, thus re%uiring the body to generate substantial force* ,( )oes the movement allow the body to move through a large full-range of motion* .ovements that answer yes to those three %uestions should go to the top of your lists. To illustrate an example head-to-head comparison we/ll review our 0ower-$ush 1ategory containing the back and front s%uat. e have ranked the back s%uat above the front s%uat because& '( Both the back and front s%uat involve multiple muscle groups working together as a system- )raw +( Both the back and front s%uat allow us to utilize heavy loads, however the back s%uat generally allows for more significant loading- in for the Back 2%uat ,( Both exercises allow for deep flexion of the ankle, knee, and hip 3 )raw 4nswering the above %uestions helped us to rank the back s%uat above the front s%uat. There can be far more considerations then the above three %uestions when ranking exercises, but they are a good place to start. hen building your workouts, try to emphasize the exercises sitting atop of your lists.

These are your staple bread and butter movements that should regularly occur in your plans. !se lower ranking exercises as occasional substitutions for varying the training stress, or taking a break when a staple movement is no longer progressing. Next up in the 5etting 2tarted 2eries&