There are no good or bad exercises. There are exercises that move you forward, and there are exercises that don’t.
More accurately, there are exercises that are aligned with your current goal, and others that aren’t.
I see it all the time. People follow an exercise program that has become more like busywork than actual training. They’re doing something, but they’re not changing the needle.
It’s the same difference as being busy versus being productive.
You can spend hours highlighting a textbook without actually learning what’s written inside.
You can reorganize your apartment without really cleaning it.
Or, in my case, you can spend an evening making beautiful to-do lists instead of doing the things on them.
Rehabilitation isn’t any different.
An exercise can be exactly what you need at one stage of rehab and almost pointless at another.
Take someone recovering from an ACL tear. Straight-leg raises are incredibly valuable when the knee is swollen, painful and you need to regain basic muscle activation.
But later on, they stop being the limiting factor.
At some point, your knee needs load. It needs strength. It needs to learn how to tolerate movement again. If you keep spending your limited training time on the easy exercises while avoiding the harder ones, your rehabilitation will eventually stall.
That’s why I constantly ask myself a simple question:
“What is the exercise that moves me furthest forward right now?”
I recently had to answer that question in my own running training.
For a long time, bilateral leg presses were one of my main strength exercises. They helped me build stronger quadriceps, and for that stage of my training they were exactly the right choice.
But eventually they stopped giving me as much return.
So I replaced them with Bulgarian split squats.
They’re certainly less enjoyable. (If you’ve ever done them, you know.)
But for running they challenge much more than just the quadriceps. They demand balance, hip stability, coordination and single-leg strength—all qualities that transfer much better to running.
Interestingly, I had tried Bulgarian split squats months earlier and didn’t get much out of them.
Not because they were bad exercises.
I simply wasn’t ready for them yet. My quadriceps weren’t strong enough and my hip stability wasn’t good enough to load the exercise properly.
The exercise stayed exactly the same.
I changed.
And that’s an important distinction.
Sometimes an exercise loses its value because you’ve outgrown it.
Sometimes it doesn’t have much value yet because you haven’t built the foundation for it.
Neither makes it a bad exercise.
It simply means it isn’t the right exercise right now.
That’s also why I prioritize exercises for every patient.
I usually tell them:
“If you’re short on time, focus on exercises one, two and three. Those are the ones that will move you forward the most right now. Everything else is optional. They’re nice additions if you have extra time or energy, but these are your priorities.”
I follow exactly the same rule in my own training.
Both my upper- and lower-body programs have a handful of exercises I never skip because they give me the biggest return on my time.
The rest are optional.
The same applies to running. Some sessions are nice to have. Others are non-negotiable because skipping them would noticeably slow my progress.
Your time and energy are limited.
Don’t spend them on exercises simply because they were once useful or because someone told you they’re “good.”
Spend them on the exercises that move you furthest forward today.
🧪 Let’s Experiment
The best exercise isn’t the hardest one.
It’s the one that moves you forward.
Instead of asking yourself whether an exercise is “good,” ask yourself whether it’s still serving its purpose.
🎯 Try This:
Look at your current exercise routine.
For each exercise, ask yourself:
- Is this still helping me progress?
- Or am I doing it simply because it’s familiar?
- If I only had time for three exercises, which ones would I keep?
Those are probably your priority exercises.
🧠 Final Thought:
Just because an exercise deserves a place in your program today doesn’t mean it deserves one forever.