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A sense of nervous excitement. Apparent is the frosty air emanating from my competitors as they do the "about to run" jiggle on the starting line.

A swift twitch of the hips.

I'm at my local Saturday morning race and I'm focused. It's almost time...

Oh, hang on. I need to start my device. So does the guy next to me.

The person behind us sighs. I'm not moving until… there! Connection established, and I'm running.

Amidst the crowd, it's challenging to spot a wrist without a smartwatch on it. And this extends beyond us runners who use them.

We're witnessing a explosive, massive industry. Companies like Apple Watch lead the market, all offering an wide array of different devices to cater to a spectrum of budgets. Based on how advanced the device you select, price tags can vary between a hundred pounds to a significant investment.

"I find it infuriating, I can't stop checking."

"It comforts me… It feels like a supporter encouraging me."

"Stop telling me about a poor sleep."

A handful of the reactions people have shared from like-minded device users when I ask what they think of theirs.

The Data Dilemma

My current opinion on my own device? At this moment, annoying. It's telling me I'm not hitting my target, leading me to doubt whether the trees I'm passing under are interfering with my satellite signal.

Millions of us attach these compact gadgets onto our wrists and use them all day and night, seemingly unconcerned with the fact they're constantly tracking us.

A distant memory are the days when we used them only to give us an rough count of our pedometer reading. Now, they can track our sleep quality, heart rate, glucose levels, our body battery.

It's difficult to find a physical metric they don't track.

But can they do what they advertise? And are the numbers we obsess over a true reflection of our actual health? Do they improve our overall health, or do the multitude of metrics and constant notifications just contribute to our everyday anxiety?

A Love-Hate Relationship

"I find myself getting a a little obsessed with mine," a wearer confesses.

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

Until she found out she could adjust the settings, her smartwatch constantly alerted her she was failing to be active enough. Now, the watch keeps telling her she's had a poor sleep score.

"I am caring for a six-month old, I don't need to be informed I'm tired," she says. "I know that all too clearly."

Couldn't she just stop wearing it?

"I suppose I could, I suppose, but I'm in this push-pull dynamic with it," she says. "I appreciate it for its fitness insights, but I'm unsure whether the myriad other functions it can now do is maybe too much for me."

How Do They Work?

Every device of smartwatch has its own proprietary way of tracking your health metrics and analysing your data, but the vast bulk use optical sensors on the back of the watch.

They commonly emit minute LED lights onto your arm which can detect blood flow, identifying your pulse rate. Higher-end devices measure changes in the electrical current that runs through the skin to gauge your nervous system activity.

A Fine Balance

A professor says that in general for smartwatches, it's a "delicate equilibrium" - while the ever-evolving tech could potentially save lives, "detecting disease before we feel unwell", it could also turn us the tracked into the "anxious healthy".

He points out that the most advanced wearables can carry out tests like electrocardiograms (ECGs), which regularly monitor how normal the heart is. They can notify if someone is experiencing an irregular rhythm, where there is irregular impulses in the heart causing an uneven pulse.

This does not mean someone is about to have a heart attack, but it can give an preliminary indication they might be more vulnerable of a blood clot in the future.

But how to interpret these numbers is complex. The expert fears that as more functions are incorporated, people may find it hard to fully understand their data.

"I'm not entirely convinced that being able to monitor so much data is such a positive development," he says.

A professor studying cardiology agrees. Her work into the impact of wearable tech on a specific group of cardiovascular patients suggested a significant portion of those who were given devices to monitor their heart health experienced heightened worry and were "far more likely to use medical services".

She noted a cycle with her patients - they spotted a alarming metric on their watch. They grew concerned. Their heart rate rose. They got more worried. They re-examined the data, and their heart rate went up again.

"When people are presented with stats about ourselves that we lack context for then, understandably, we are going to want to know more," the psychologist says. "We look, we obsess - it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy."