Planned vs completed training: why a tracker should never overwrite the plan with the log

Two records, not one

A training plan is a set of intentions. A training log is a set of facts. They are related but they are not the same thing, and the most common failure in workout trackers is to store only one of them.

A logger that has no plan cannot tell you where you deviated, because it never knew what you meant to do. A planner that overwrites the plan with what you logged loses the intention the moment you finish the session. Either way, when you look back at a block and ask "did I do what I set out to do", the data cannot answer.

The fix is simple to state. Store what was planned, store what happened, keep them apart, and show both.

What Method stores

When you start a scheduled session in Method, the workout record captures the prescription it was started from as a snapshot of exercises, sets, reps, effort targets, and rest. That snapshot is frozen for that workout. The sets you then log are stored separately as what happened. The two sit side by side for the life of the record.

The consequences follow from that one decision.

History is stable. Edit next week's program, bulk edit a field across every week, swap an exercise across the program, or delete the program. Every completed workout still shows what it was meant to be on the day. There is no way to make a past session look as though it was planned differently.

Partial sessions are visible. In the activity view, a completed session where an exercise fell short of its prescription is marked partial rather than complete. Cardio-only sessions are always complete. "Partial" is a statement about the plan and the log together, which only works because both exist.

Unplanned work is labelled. An ad hoc workout has no prescription, so it is recorded as unplanned. It counts as training. It does not count against a plan. A tracker that only has a log cannot make this distinction.

Moved and skipped are different. A session trained on a different day shows as moved. A session you chose not to do is marked skipped. "Missed" applies only to days you had actually planned; a rest day with no session never reads as a miss.

Counts, not a score

On a program, Method shows planned to date, completed, skipped, and upcoming. It does not show an adherence percentage.

A single percentage flattens things that should not be flattened. Skipping a deload session and skipping the week's heaviest squat day both subtract one from the same number. Two athletes at 80% can have had entirely different weeks. The counts are the information; the percentage is an opinion about the counts, and Method leaves the opinion to you.

What this makes possible later

Because the prescription travels with the record, analytics can separate prescribed sets from improvised ones without asking you to tag anything. Exercise history can show the target beside each logged set. Exports can carry program, week, and day on every row. And when you review a block, the question "where did the plan and the week disagree" has an answer in the data.

If you have been logging without a plan

Nothing is lost. Ad hoc workouts are full records. When you start writing sessions in advance, from the next one onwards each workout will carry its prescription, and the two views will begin to diverge in useful ways. See how to program workouts in advance.