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A sense of feeling of anticipation. Apparent is the chilled vapour emanating from my rivals as they execute the "starting line" jiggle on the beginning point.

A quick twitch of the hips.

I'm participating in my local weekly parkrun event and I mean business. Three, two, one...

Oh, hang on. I must adjust my device. As does the person alongside me.

The person waiting sighs. I won't start until… there! Signal acquired, I'm off.

Amidst the crowd, it's difficult to see a person without a fitness tracker on it. And this isn't only us runners who wear them.

It's a booming, massive industry. Brands like Samsung Galaxy are prevalent, all offering an wide array of various versions to suit a variety of budgets. Depending on how advanced the device you go for, price tags can start from £100 to thousands of pounds.

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

"It reassures me… It acts as a supporter encouraging me."

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

A handful of the comments I've received from other device users when I question what they think of theirs.

A Sea of Statistics

My current opinion on mine? Currently, annoying. It's telling me I'm off pace, causing me to question whether the overhead branches I'm running below are disrupting my location tracking.

Millions of us strap these little gadgets onto our arms and use them 24/7, seemingly comfortable with the fact they're continuously monitoring us.

Gone are the days when we used them only to give us an idea of our step count. Today, they can track our nightly rest, heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), our VO2 max.

It's difficult to find a physical metric they fail to monitor.

But are they able to do what they claim to do? And are the data points we obsess over a true reflection of the truth? Do they enhance our mental and physical wellbeing, or do the avalanche of measurements and constant notifications just contribute to our everyday anxiety?

A Complicated Bond

"I become a quite preoccupied with mine," one user reveals.

While she values how her device tracks her exercise, she finds some of its other capabilities "daunting" at times - a feeling initially realised during a pregnancy.

Until she found out she could change its configuration, her smartwatch kept telling her she was not being active enough. Later on, the watch keeps telling her she's had a restless night.

"I have a six-month old, I don't need to be informed I'm tired," she says. "I'm acutely aware only too well."

Couldn't she just take it off?

"I could, theoretically, but I'm in this complicated dynamic with it," she continues. "I value it for its exercise data, but I'm unsure whether the additional features it can now do is possibly overkill for me."

How Do They Work?

Each model of smartwatch has its own proprietary way of measuring your bodily functions and analysing your data, but the most use sensors on the underside of the watch.

They usually emit tiny, coloured LED lights onto your skin which can monitor pulsation, identifying your BPM. More advanced devices measure changes in the bioimpedance that passes over the skin to gauge your nervous system activity.

The Professional Viewpoint

One expert says that in general for smartwatches, it's a "delicate equilibrium" - while the continuously improving tech could actually prevent illness, "identifying issues before we feel unwell", it could also turn us the tracked into the "worried well".

He points out that some of the latest wearables can carry out tests like heart rhythm analysis, which constantly monitor how stable the heart is. They can flag if someone is experiencing an irregular rhythm, where there is abnormal signals in the heart causing an uneven pulse.

This does not mean someone is imminently going to suffer a cardiac event, but it can give an preliminary indication they might be more susceptible of a blood clot in the years to come.

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

"I'm not entirely convinced that having the capacity to monitor so much data is such a beneficial thing," he says.

A professor focusing on cardiology agrees. Research into the impact of wearable tech on a specific group of individuals with health issues suggested a significant portion of those who were given devices to monitor their condition experienced heightened worry and were "far more likely to use healthcare resources".

She observed a vicious circle with her patients - they spotted a concerning reading on their watch. They grew concerned. Their BPM rose. They got even more concerned. They re-examined the data, and their heart rate rose further.

"Upon viewing numbers about ourselves that we lack context for then, understandably, we are going to seek clarification," the psychologist says. "We check, we re-check - it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy."