Spooky Strong: Strength on the Total Gym

Spooky Strong: Strength on the Total Gym

A Total-Body Circuit to Spook Your Muscles!

Maria Sollon, MS, CSCS, PES

When it comes to strength training, nothing’s scarier than a stale routine. Your muscles are smart.  They adapt quickly, and when they know what’s coming, the progress can vanish like a ghost in the night!

This Spooky Strong Total Gym workout is designed to keep those muscles guessing, challenging them with unexpected moves and clever combinations so they stay alert, engaged, and ready to grow stronger.

The Spooky Strong Circuit

Just like a good jump scare, the secret is variety. By mixing classic Total Gym moves with hand-weight combos, you create new angles of resistance that shock your system in the best way. Different planes of motion, alternating tempos, and surprise transitions force your body to recruit more stabilizers and fire more muscle fibers. So scary, right?! This routine will definitely haunt your strength from head to toe.

Set Up: Low-Medium Level

Equipment: Total Gym, hand weights, timer APP

Directions:

• Perform each move for 45 seconds with 15 seconds of transition.
• Complete 2–3 rounds for a full-body fright fest.
• Mix up the tempos to shock your system.
• Aim to complete this workout 2 times a week or alongside your other routines.
• If time is tight, 1 set is still enough to spook your muscles!

Moves:

1. Ghost Glides & High Pull (Legs & Back) – Lateral lunge adding a single-arm row at the top. Do both sides.
2. Scare Crow Curl & Extend (Legs, Biceps & Triceps) – Reverse lunge with bicep and tricep “trick” between movements. Do both sides.
3. Spider Crawls (Shoulders & Core) – Pike-to-plank knee taps. Keep the core tight and shoulders burning. Advanced: face away with hands on floor.
4. Haunted Chest Flies & Bridge (Legs & Chest) – Supine on glideboard, chest flies while hips are simultaneously extending into a bridge; use a spooky slow negative tempo.
5. Monster Squat Press & Plank Thrusts (Legs, Shoulders, Core) – Squat and overhead press, place weights down to slide back into a plank with hands on the floor. Return to repeat the combo. For intensity, add an explosive jump on the squat and press for a final fright. Modify: Omit gliding out. Instead, maintain a table top stance (hands on floor, knees hovering over GB). Walk the feet up and down to the glideboard, then squat & press.

Spooky Tip:
Choose a level of incline that challenges your strength but still lets you control each movement. Control is key!  Don’t let those “monsters” (aka sloppy reps) sneak in!

Check out the video to see a demo of how these spooky moves are performed on your Total Gym.

The Secret Behind Spooky Strength

Muscle confusion is a smart, science-backed strategy. By changing movement patterns, planes, and resistance demands, you force your muscles to adapt, sparking new strength and stamina gains. Pairing the Total Gym’s dynamic cable system with hand weights amplifies the challenge, creating tension from multiple directions to keep your muscles guessing—and growing—every rep of the way.

Ghost Your Limits

This October, let your workout give you goosebumps. Get on your Total Gym, add a few “haunted” hand weights, and scare your muscles into next-level strength.

Keep them guessing, keep them growing, and stay Spooky Strong.

Maria

@GROOVYSWEAT  

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