How Incline Bodyweight Trainers Work: A Mentor's Guide to the Total Gym

If you’re shopping for home gym equipment, you’ve almost certainly run into a paradox.

It’s the paradox of the Total Gym.

On one side, you have 5-star reviews like “Krykie’s,” who calls it a “solid piece of equipment” that was essential for post-surgery rehab. On the other, you have 1-star nightmares like “Akrostichon’s,” who received a “deformed wheel,” “bad welding,” and “tons of dents and scratches.”

So, what’s the truth? Is this machine a brilliant, low-impact fitness tool or a poorly made scam?

As your mentor in this space, I’ll tell you the answer: it’s both.

The Total Gym represents a brilliant design often let down by a complicated delivery and vendor network. To be a smart buyer, you need to understand both. This isn’t a review; this is a guide to separating the genius concept from the real-world gamble.

Let’s break down what this machine is, why its design is so smart, and (most importantly) how to ensure you get a good one.

Part 1: The Genius — Why the Concept Is Brilliant

At its core, an incline bodyweight trainer (the category that includes the Total Gym and competitors like the Weider Ultimate Body Works) is just an elegant evolution of the push-up. It’s a tool that lets you harness gravity.

Lesson 1: The Physics of the “Gravity Ramp”

The genius of this machine is its simplicity. Imagine you need to push a 150-pound box. Pushing it straight up (a military press) is incredibly hard. Pushing it up a long, gentle ramp is much, much easier.

This machine is a variable-angle ramp for your body. The 15 levels of resistance don’t add weight; they simply change the steepness of the ramp.

• Level 1 (Lowest Incline): You might only be lifting 3% of your body weight. This is the “gentle ramp.” It’s perfect for warming up or for the very beginning of a physical therapy program.
• Level 15 (Highest Incline): You might be lifting over 50% of your body weight. This is the “steep ramp,” providing a significant challenge even for fit individuals.

This system is called “progressive overload,” and it’s exceptionally clean. There are no clanking weight stacks or finicky pins, just the smooth, consistent pull of Earth’s gravity, dialed to your exact need. This is why 5-star user “Krykie” loved it for knee surgery recovery—they could do one-legged exercises at a low, controlled level that free weights would make impossible.

Lesson 2: Why It’s a “Smart” Workout, Not Just an “Easy” One

This is the most important lesson. This machine feels different from a typical gym machine because it trains your body’s “sixth sense.”

It Teaches Muscles to Work Together

In physical therapy, we talk about Closed Kinetic Chain (CKC) exercises. It’s a fancy term for a simple idea: * Open Chain: Your hand or foot moves freely (e.g., a bicep curl or a leg extension machine). This isolates one muscle. * Closed Chain: Your hand or foot is fixed on a surface, and your body moves (e.g., a push-up or a squat).

CKC exercises are what build functional strength for the real world. A leg extension machine makes your quad stronger. A real squat teaches your quads, glutes, hamstrings, and core how to work together to stand up.

Almost every exercise on the Total Gym FIT Ultimate is a Closed Kinetic Chain movement. You are pushing or pulling your own body along the gliding board. This trains muscle coordination, not just isolation.

It Wakes Up Your “Stabilizer” Muscles

The glideboard is a slightly unstable, moving surface. To perform a chest press or a row, you can’t just shove. You have to control the movement. This constant, tiny act of balancing forces your deep, intrinsic stabilizer muscles around your shoulders, hips, and spine to wake up and do their job.

This is proprioception—your body’s ability to sense itself in space. It’s something a fixed-path machine, which locks you into a single groove, simply cannot train. This is the “soul” of the machine and why it’s so effective for rebuilding functional strength after an injury.

Part 2: The Gamble — A Mentor’s Guide to Buying Smart

Okay, you’re sold on the concept. Now, let’s address the 1-star reviews. How do you avoid being “Akrostichon,” who received a machine with a “deformed wheel” and “bad welding”?

The problem is twofold: manufacturing consistency and the vendor lottery. These machines are often sold through various third-party sellers on sites like Amazon, not just from the main company. As one 1-star review put it, “attachments came wrapped in Kroger grocery bags.”

You are buying a design. The execution of that design can vary wildly. A good mentor doesn’t just teach; they warn. Here is your inspection checklist for the day it arrives, before you spend an hour assembling it.

Your 5-Minute “Is This a Lemon?” Inspection

1. Open the Box and Check the Wheels: This is the #1 complaint. Before you do anything else, find the glideboard. Look at the wheels. Are they perfectly round? Are they smooth, or do they have dents? Spin them. Do they roll freely, or do they wobble? A “deformed wheel” (like Akrostichon’s) makes the entire machine useless.
2. Inspect the Welds: Look at the “XL Squat Stand” and where the main tower connects to the base. A 1-star review mentioned, “the wing attachment can’t be attached… Bad welding!” You don’t need to be an expert. Do the metal joints look clean and solid, or do they look “goopy,” porous, and incomplete?
3. Do a Full Parts Inventory (The “Kroger Bag” Test): Are all the attachments, pins, and pulleys (like the AbCrunch, Leg Pulley, etc.) professionally wrapped and accounted for? Lay everything out and check it against the manual. This is where “chasity aiken’s” 1-star “SCAM” review came from.
4. Check for “Dents and Scratches”: A few cosmetic scuffs on a 63lb piece of steel equipment are normal. What you’re looking for are deep dents on the rails the glideboard slides on. Run your hand along the main rails. Any dent or obstruction there will cause a “thud” every time you slide, ruining the smooth motion.

If you find a deformed wheel or a bad weld, do not assemble it. Document it, take photos, and start the return process immediately.

Conclusion: Who Is This Machine Really For?

Now that we’ve separated the genius from the gamble, it’s easy to see who this machine is for.

This machine is not for powerlifters or bodybuilders who want to isolate muscles and lift massive, heavy weights. You will be disappointed by the resistance.

This machine is for: * The Rehab User (Like “Krykie”): Someone recovering from a joint (knee, shoulder, hip) injury who needs safe, low-impact, and highly controllable resistance. * The Functional Fitness Seeker: Someone who wants to build real-world, coordinated strength, balance, and core stability, not just “mirror muscles.” * The Home-Gym Beginner: Someone who is intimidated by free weights and complex machines and wants a single, foldable device that can provide a true full-body workout.

The incline bodyweight trainer is an elegant, effective tool based on sound physics and biomechanics. Its only-begotten sin is that its manufacturing and fulfillment chain doesn’t always match the brilliance of its original concept.

By understanding how it works and what to look for on arrival, you’ve moved from being a hopeful shopper to an educated buyer. That’s the first and most important step to getting in shape.