No Pain, No Sweat

Kym Bassett considers herself an expert in gym fads. She has taken orders from aerobic Step Nazis; she has pumped iron with the manly men. She ran like a rat on a treadmill and searched for Nirvana in yoga. Very little about her body changed over seven years, mostly because she seesawed from five-day-a-week workouts to none at all. Last November the Manhattan jewelry designer noticed a story about Pilates, a regimen based on stretching exercises. "I had no idea how to even pronounce it," says Bassett of her impulsive call to make an appointment. (It's Puh-lah-tees.) "I just knew I...