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A sense of nervous excitement. Apparent is the cold breath emanating from my fellow runners as they do the "starting line" shuffle on the start line.

A quick movement of the hips.

I'm participating in my local 5km community parkrun and I mean business. The countdown begins...

Hold on. I must adjust my tracker. The same goes for the runner next to me.

The person behind us expresses impatience. I refuse to go until… done! Connection established, away I go.

During the scramble, it's difficult to see a wrist without a fitness tracker on it. And it's not just us athletes who rely on them.

We're witnessing a explosive, multi-billion pound sector. Companies like Garmin are prevalent, featuring an extensive array of diverse versions to cater to a range of lifestyles. Based on how advanced the model you go for, price tags can range from a hundred pounds to a small fortune.

"It drives me insane, I'm unable to stop checking."

"It reassures me… It acts as a companion supporting me."

"Please don't notify me I've experienced a restless night."

A small sample of the comments I've received from other smartwatch wearers when I inquire what they their opinion is on theirs.

A Sea of Statistics

My feelings on mine? Currently, frustrating. It's indicating I'm not hitting my target, making me wonder whether the trees I'm passing under are interfering with my satellite signal.

Millions of us strap these little monitors onto our arms and keep them on 24/7, ostensibly unconcerned with the fact they're continuously tracking us.

Long past are the days when we used them only to give us an rough count of our step count. Now, they can measure our nightly rest, blood pressure, heart rate variability (HRV), our VO2 max.

It's difficult to find a bodily function they aren't designed to measure.

But are they able to do what they say they do? And are the statistics we obsess over a true reflection of reality? Do they enhance our daily wellness, or do the plethora of measurements and cheerleading alerts just increase our everyday anxiety?

A Complicated Bond

"I find myself getting a bit fixated with mine," a wearer admits.

While she appreciates how her device tracks her runs, she finds some of its other features "daunting" at times - a feeling first discovered during a major life event.

Until she found out she could change its configuration, her smartwatch repeatedly informed her she was not being active enough. In a new phase, the watch keeps telling her she's had a poor sleep score.

"I am caring for a six-month old, there's no point to be informed I've not slept," she says. "I'm acutely aware only too well."

Couldn't she just remove it?

"It's possible, theoretically, but I've got this complicated dynamic with it," she says. "I love it for its workout tracking, but I'm unsure whether the myriad other functions it can now do is maybe overkill for me."

The Technology Behind the Tracking

Every device of smartwatch has its own novel way of tracking your bodily functions and analysing your data, but the majority use sensors on the reverse of the watch.

They typically shine tiny, coloured LED lights onto your wrist which can observe pulsation, detecting your pulse rate. Sophisticated devices detect changes in the bioimpedance that runs through the skin to get an idea of your stress levels.

A Fine Balance

A professor says that overall for smartwatches, it's a "delicate equilibrium" - while the continuously improving tech could potentially aid early diagnosis, "detecting disease before we show symptoms", it could also turn us watch wearers into the "anxious healthy".

He points out that the most advanced wearables can perform tests like medical-grade monitoring, which continuously monitor how normal the heart is. They can notify if someone is experiencing atrial fibrillation (AF), where there is irregular signals in the heart causing an irregular heartbeat.

This does not mean someone is about to have a heart attack, but it can give an preliminary indication they might be more susceptible of a heart problem in the long term.

But how to understand these readings is complex. The expert worries that as further capabilities are incorporated, people may not be able to fully contextualise their data.

"I have some doubts that having the capacity to monitor so many things is such a good idea," he says.

A health researcher focusing on cardiology agrees. Her work into the effect of wearable tech on a cohort of individuals with health issues suggested a noticeable percentage of those who were given devices to monitor their condition experienced greater stress and were "had a higher tendency to use healthcare resources".

She observed a cycle with her patients - they saw a concerning reading on their watch. They became worried. Their heart rate went up. They got more worried. They looked a second time, and their heart rate rose further.

"Upon viewing data about ourselves that we can't properly interpret then, understandably, we are going to become concerned," the psychologist says. "We check, we obsess - it becomes a vicious cycle."