Dancing with Gravity: The Biomechanics of Bodyweight Training and the Genius of Incline Machines

For months, they float in a world without weight, a realm of effortless movement that seems like a dream. But for astronauts aboard the International Space Station, this dream comes with a harsh reality. Robbed of the constant, gentle pull of Earth’s gravity, their bodies begin to betray them. Muscles atrophy, and bones lose density at an alarming rate. Their plight offers a profound lesson from the void: gravity is not a burden to be overcome, but the fundamental sculptor of our strength and vitality. What if, instead of simply enduring this force, we could learn to converse with it, to dial its intensity up or down at will? This is the elegant premise behind incline bodyweight training, a sophisticated dance between human physiology and fundamental physics, beautifully exemplified in systems like the Total Gym APEX.

As a kinesiologist who has spent decades studying the marvel of human movement, I find a particular beauty in tools that leverage simplicity for profound results. The genius of an incline trainer lies not in complex motors or heavy iron, but in its masterful manipulation of a single, universal principle.

The Physics of a Graceful Lift: Turning Weight into a Whisper

Imagine trying to push a car on a flat road versus up a steep hill. The car’s mass is constant, but the required effort changes dramatically with the slope. An incline trainer applies this exact principle to your body. When you lie on its sliding platform, you become the car. The frame’s 8 resistance levels are simply eight different slopes. At the lowest level, the incline is so gentle that you are only lifting a small fraction of your body weight. As you raise the incline, you are asking your muscles to work against a greater component of gravity’s pull. In essence, the machine acts as a “gravity dial,” allowing you to select a precise percentage of your own body weight as resistance, a concept elegantly described by Newton’s laws of motion.

This design has a critical, built-in safety feature: it is inherently low-impact. Traditional weight-bearing exercises like running or squats create significant axial compression—a direct downward force—on the spine and joints. On a sliding board, that force is redirected along the length of your body. It becomes a smooth, gliding resistance rather than a percussive impact. This is why users like Rebecca, who noted in a June 2025 review that she has a “really bad back,” found it to be a game-changer. It allowed her to strengthen her legs and core without the painful compression, a perfect example of intelligent exercise design accommodating human physiology.

The Body’s Sixth Sense: Awakening Proprioception

Now, let’s go deeper than just muscles and bones. Close your eyes and touch your finger to your nose. That seemingly simple act is a miracle of a hidden “sixth sense” called proprioception—your brain’s intricate, real-time map of where your body parts are in space. It’s the internal GPS that allows for coordinated, balanced movement. And one of the best ways to train this sense is to challenge it with instability.

This is where the magic of the moving glideboard comes into play. As you push and pull, the platform is in constant, subtle motion. Your nervous system is forced to fire on all cylinders, making thousands of micro-adjustments per second to keep you stable and your movement path true. It’s like transforming a simple push-up into a complex balancing act that recruits your deepest stabilizing muscles. This is the science behind the observation from exercise physiologist Curt Bolling in his 2021 review: “you literally have to work out your core to perform nearly every exercise involved on this machine.” It’s not about doing crunches; it’s about awakening the body’s innate gyroscope, forging a powerful and reflexive core stability from the inside out.

A Symphony of Movement: Functional Strength and Controlled Contractions

Modern exercise science has increasingly moved away from training isolated muscles to training integrated movements. This is the core of functional strength—building power that translates directly to real-life activities. An incline trainer excels here. Consider a single seated rowing motion. It’s a symphony of muscular action: your back and shoulder muscles pull, your biceps assist, your core locks down your torso, and your glutes and legs stabilize your base. You are training muscles to work as a team, just as they do when you lift a heavy suitcase or pull a garden hose.

Furthermore, this system allows for the conscious mastery of both phases of muscle contraction. The push or pull phase is the concentric contraction, where the muscle shortens under load. But equally, if not more important for building strength and control, is the eccentric contraction—the return phase, where the muscle lengthens while still under tension. On a sliding trainer, controlling the speed of your return against the pull of gravity is a potent eccentric workout. This controlled “braking” action is phenomenal for building resilient muscle tissue and enhancing joint stability.

An Echo of History, A Vision for the Home

The idea of using a sliding carriage against resistance is not new. It echoes the brilliant work of Joseph Pilates, whose famous “Reformer” machine, invented in the early 20th century, used a similar concept with springs to rehabilitate and strengthen the body. The Total Gym APEX can be seen as a modern descendant of this philosophy, engineered for the accessibility and practicality of a home setting, notably with its ability to fold away.

Of course, no single design is without its specific considerations. As the expert review from Curt Bolling prudently noted, the standard squat stand on this particular model may be too small for some individuals to maintain perfect biomechanical form, and the 300-pound weight capacity is a firm structural limit. This isn’t a failure of the underlying principle but rather a crucial piece of data for the discerning user. It highlights that the application of science must always be tailored to the individual’s body and goals.

More Than Movement, It’s Mastery

Ultimately, to engage with a tool like this is to engage in a dialogue with your own body. It’s a chance to feel the laws of physics working through your limbs, to awaken a dormant neurological awareness, and to conduct a symphony of muscles working in harmony. The goal transcends mere fitness; it evolves into a form of physical literacy. It is the satisfying feeling of achieving a difficult movement not through brute force, but through elegant control. This is the beauty of intelligent training: it’s not about a war against gravity, but about learning, with grace and power, how to dance with it.