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There's a nervous excitement. Apparent is the chilled vapour emanating from my competitors as they perform the "about to run" shuffle on the beginning point.

A quick flick of the hips.

I'm lined up for my local 5km community parkrun and I mean business. It's almost time...

Hold on. I have to start my tracker. The same goes for the runner alongside me.

The person waiting expresses impatience. I refuse to go until… done! Connection established, I'm off.

In the mele, it's difficult to see a wrist without a smartwatch on it. And it's not just us runners who wear them.

We're witnessing a explosive, multi-billion pound industry. Companies like Samsung Galaxy are prevalent, each with an extensive array of diverse versions to cater to a variety of needs. According to how feature-packed the device you go for, price tags can start from a hundred pounds to thousands of pounds.

"It makes me crazy, I can't stop checking."

"It provides solace… It acts as a friend encouraging me."

"Please don't notify me I've had a poor sleep."

A small sample of the comments people have shared from other tracker enthusiasts when I ask what they feel about theirs.

The Monitoring Conundrum

My thoughts on mine? Currently, annoying. It's indicating my speed is wrong, leading me to doubt whether the foliage along my route are blocking my satellite signal.

Millions of us strap these compact monitors onto our arms and keep them on constantly, apparently unconcerned with the fact they're constantly recording us.

Gone are the days when we depended on them exclusively to give us an rough count of our daily steps. Now, they can measure our sleep quality, heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), our body battery.

It's tricky to find a health indicator they don't track.

But can they do what they say they do? And are the data points we scrutinise a true reflection of the truth? Do they boost our mental and physical wellbeing, or do the multitude of readings and cheerleading alerts just add to our everyday anxiety?

A Love-Hate Relationship

"I do get a a little fixated with mine," an individual admits.

While she values how her device monitors her workouts, she finds some of its other features "overwhelming" at times - a feeling initially realised during a pregnancy.

Prior to discovering she could put it into a specific mode, her smartwatch constantly alerted her she was being insufficiently productive enough. In a new phase, the watch keeps telling her she's had a poor sleep score.

"I've got a six-month old, it's unnecessary for me to be notified I'm tired," she says. "I know that only too well."

Is it not possible to just remove it?

"I suppose I could, theoretically, but I have this love-hate relationship with it," she says. "I appreciate it for its exercise data, I just wonder whether the additional features it can now do is perhaps too much for me."

The Technology Behind the Tracking

Each model of smartwatch has its own proprietary way of measuring your health metrics and interpreting your data, but the vast bulk use sensors on the underside of the watch.

They typically project tiny, coloured LED lights onto your skin which can monitor pulsation, identifying your pulse rate. More advanced devices detect changes in the skin conductance that flows through the skin to gauge your stress levels.

A Fine Balance

A professor says that for most people for smartwatches, it's a "delicate equilibrium" - while the rapidly advancing tech could potentially aid early diagnosis, "detecting disease before we notice anything", 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 electrocardiograms (ECGs), which continuously monitor how stable the heart is. They can flag if someone is experiencing an irregular rhythm, where there is erratic electrical activity in the heart causing an irregular heartbeat.

This does not necessarily indicate someone is on the verge of a heart attack, but it can give an early warning they might be more vulnerable of a stroke in the years to come.

But how to interpret these readings is not straightforward. The expert worries that as further capabilities are incorporated, people may find it hard to fully comprehend their data.

"I remain sceptical that the ability to monitor so many things is such a good idea," he says.

A professor specialising in patient behaviour concurs. Research into the impact of wearable tech on a specific group of cardiovascular patients suggested a minority of those who were given devices to monitor their condition experienced greater stress and were "more inclined to use doctor's time".

She noted a cycle with her patients - they noticed a worrying figure on their watch. They felt anxious. Their pulse increased. They got more worried. They checked again, and their heart rate increased again.

"When people are presented with numbers about ourselves that we don't really understand then, of course, we are going to become concerned," the psychologist says. "We check, we obsess - it becomes a vicious cycle."