The Bone Program ScorecardScore anyone with it. Including us.

Eleven questions worth asking before you give anyone your money or your time — us, a gym, a studio, a franchise down the road. The criteria come from the loading literature, not from our marketing, and they apply to everyone equally. If a program can't answer these, that tells you something. If we can't, that tells you something too. Print it, take it with you, and use it on us first.

Bone adapts to loads that exceed what it is already used to. Anything at or below your customary daily load is, in the language of the research, in the 'adapted' zone — maintained, not built. This is the single idea that decides whether a program can work at all.^1,2

If nothing is measured, nobody can tell whether the load exceeded your threshold, and neither can you. Measurement is also the only honest way to know whether you are progressing, as opposed to merely attending.¹

Bone's response saturates quickly — a handful of loading cycles captures most of the available adaptation, and adding volume adds little. Inserting rest between cycles measurably amplifies the response. So a short session is not a shortcut; it is what the research actually describes.^3,4,2

Strain *rate* influences adaptation independently of peak strain — how quickly the load arrives matters, not only how large it is. Programs built entirely around slow, static holds are missing a variable that the literature treats as controlling.^5,6

Bone adapts where it is loaded, not globally. A program that loads only the arms will not do much for a hip. The fractures that change people's lives are hip and spine, so those are the sites that have to be addressed.^7,2

High loads are safe when they are controlled and unsafe when they are not. The best human evidence for high-intensity loading in postmenopausal women with low bone mass came from closely supervised programs, and the authors were explicit that supervision was part of the safety result.^8,9

This is a character test, not a technical one. Loading is one input among several — nutrition, vitamin D, hormones, medication where it is indicated, and fall prevention all matter, and none of them are replaced by loading. Anyone unwilling to say so is selling.¹⁰

Most hip fractures are not caused by weak bone alone — they happen when someone falls onto it. Density is half the equation and the fall is the other half, yet almost every bone program sells only the first half. Exercise programmes that specifically challenge balance measurably reduce falls in older adults; that is a separate benefit from anything happening inside the bone.^11,12

This is the fastest way for a stranger to sort a clinical operation from a sales operation. If a program can tell you what you need before it has any information about you, the recommendation was decided before you walked in. Measurement first also gives you the only thing that makes a later result meaningful: a starting point.¹³

Every honest program has people it is not right for — because of a medical contraindication, because their bones are genuinely fine, or because something else should come first. Ask directly. The answer is a character test, and it is very hard to fake on the spot.^8,9

Six months in, do you understand why you are doing each thing, what your numbers mean, and what you would do if you moved away tomorrow? Programs that teach produce people who stick with it and can act on their own; programs that keep you dependent produce attendance. A good one should make you need it less over time, not more.¹⁴

Nothing scored yet

Work down the eleven and mark what you actually heard — not what you assume. If you are scoring from a website rather than a conversation, most of these will land on "didn't say", and that is itself a finding.

Your answers stay in this browser. Nothing is submitted, and we never see them.

Where we score badly

Scoring ourselves honestly on our own eleven: we load hip and spine, we measure force every session and show you the number, sessions are brief and weekly by design, you are supervised one-to-one every time, balance work is part of the program, and we measure you before anyone talks about membership. That is the case for us, and it is why the scorecard is written this way. On the last question we score well for a reason worth naming out loud: we built an entire academy and gave the first tier away, and the page you are reading is us doing it. Judge that however you like — but you should know it.

Now the other side. It will not change how you look. What we develop is force production — the ability of your nervous system and muscle to generate high force — not muscle size. Those are different adaptations, and only one of them meaningfully loads bone. If your goal is a bigger frame, this is the wrong purchase.

It is not your cardiovascular training and it is not your whole activity plan. A weekly session is a skeletal stimulus, not exercise. You still need to walk, move and get your heart rate up, and we will tell you so. It is not medical treatment. We do not prescribe, we do not manage medication, and if a bone program ever tells you to stop a prescribed drug, leave. Nutrition genuinely matters here and we do address it — but through a separate service, not inside the weekly session, so when you score anyone on this ask who handles it and whether it costs extra.

And it costs money and asks you to show up, in person, week after week. The honest timeline is 8 to 24 months, and where you land in that range depends on where you are starting, your hormonal situation, whether you are on bone medication and how consistently you come. Two things move on different clocks, and any program that blurs them is overpromising: your force output changes early and you can watch it session to session, while your bone cannot be meaningfully remeasured for at least a year — rescan sooner than that and you are reading noise, not progress. So expect to spend the first stretch trusting the mechanism and your own numbers. The evidence base is not all ours, either. The strongest human trial evidence for high-intensity loading in low bone mass comes from supervised barbell training, which is a different modality from ours — the published literature on our equipment is thinner. If you already lift heavy under good coaching and your hip and spine are loaded, you may not need us. And if getting here weekly is unrealistic for you, a program you actually attend beats a better one you don't.