Invest in a serious sports bra. "Don't go for the look, go for the feel," recommends Anne Kelly, president of Junonia, a company specializing in athletic wear for larger women. "Because if you're bouncing all over the place, you're going to feel like people are looking at you." If you hate the compressed "uniboob" look, sturdy underwire sports bras lift, hold and separate, like those available from Champion and and Speedo, among others.

While women don't always welcome breast-squishing bras, everyone loves compression when it minimizes cellulite and makes thighs and tummies look tauter. A Big Attitude, another line of workout clothing for full-figured women, uses a special 45 percent Lycra fabric in its bestselling Cellulite Smoothers ‑- compression bike shorts, leggings and leotards ‑- while Junonia offers pants with supportive mesh inserts to hold your stomach and lower back in place.

Gym newbies tend to pile on oversized clothes and lots of layers. Don't. "If you're a medium, wear a medium," says Cox. "Clothes that are too small can make you look larger, but clothes that are too large can also add pounds." Instead go for cuts that follow the line of your shape and have some waist definition. Wearing a tent down to your crotch to hide a rounded stomach, for example, will only make you (and your legs) look short and stumpy, and you're better off with a figure-skimming T-shirt that hits you at high- or mid-hip. Caroline Bollinger, fitness editor at Prevention, recommends Prana's princess-seamed Tawny Tank. As for layering, just keep in mind that layers add bulk ‑- and that you'll have to strip down as you heat up.