A method for routing an incoming service request is described wherein the service request is routed to a selected storage tier based on that selected storage tier having a predicted value indicating a state having greater utility as compared with the predicted value of the state associated with at least one other storage tier within the storage system. A computer system comprising a multi-tier storage system is described, the multi-tier storage system having a routing algorithm configured to adaptively tune functions which map variables describing the state of each storage tier of the storage system into the average latency experienced by incoming service requests associated with the storage tier.