If you’re anything like me, you’ve probably seen a ton of videos from guys like Jeff Nippard and Mike Israetel claiming to be “science-based.” They break down lifting techniques backed by research, and yeah, sometimes there’s evidence suggesting their methods are solid.
Following the Evidence Doesn’t Mean You’re Following Science
But here’s the thing… that’s not actually science. Just because you follow the evidence doesn’t mean you’re “science-based.”
One alternative would be “bro science,” which still follows selective evidence. The problem is, cherry-picking studies to back up what you already believe isn’t all that different from taking gym anecdotes as gospel. It just sounds fancier.
You Are an N of 1
Exercise science is still in its early days. A lot of studies in this field have major limitations, especially with sample sizes and demographics. Many aren’t even close to being representative of the general population—or even the average gym-goer.
Most studies use small groups of college-aged dudes who already lift. That’s cool, but can it really tell a 35-year-old office worker, a 50-year-old beginner, or a competitive powerlifter how they should train? Probably not.
Big, well-designed studies can be helpful, but when you’re looking at results from 25 healthy undergrads, that’s barely better than just asking your gym buddies what works for them.
Meta-Analysis and Systematic Reviews
To try and get around these issues, exercise science relies on meta-analyses and systematic reviews—basically studies that combine a bunch of other studies to look for trends.
Sounds good in theory. But in practice, a lot of meta-analyses in exercise science end up inconclusive. If the individual studies are weak, piling them together doesn’t magically make them solid. At best, they hint at general trends, but they don’t solve the core problem of small, unrepresentative samples.
You’re Probably Just Confirming Your Priors
Let’s be honest… most of us look for research that backs up what we already believe. If you love high-volume training, you’ll find studies saying it’s the best. If you swear by training to failure, guess what? There’s research for that too. The truth is, most fitness research can be interpreted in different ways, and we tend to see what we want to see.
So, Should We Ignore These Studies?
No! This research still matters. It’s just important to recognize its limitations and not treat every new study as the ultimate truth.
At the end of the day, no two people are the same, especially when it comes to fitness. Your results depend on genetics, lifestyle, training history, nutrition, sleep, stress, and about a hundred other things that a 12-week study with 30 participants can’t account for. Honestly, with the small sample sizes we have, it’s not even clear if most exercise studies apply to populations, let alone individuals.
What's Next for the Field?
Exercise science is still developing, and blindly following studies won’t necessarily get you better results. Use research as a guide, but at the end of the day, the best “study” you have is your own experience. Try things, track what works, and adjust accordingly, because you are your own best case study. This is where we are seeing the field of exercise going to writ large.
Companies like Whoop are creating hyper-individualized studies for each user. In Whoop you can run your own experiments on yourself (for instance, when I used Whoop, I was able to see how my sleep affected my overall performance). This has its own drawbacks though. After all, an N of 1 means literally just you. And not only that, it's literally just you in a specific time period.
I'll have more to say on this later. Stay tuned.
