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An atmosphere of building tension. Apparent is the frosty air exhaled by my fellow runners as they do the "starting line" jiggle on the start line.

A swift flick of the hips.

I'm lined up for my local weekly parkrun event and I'm focused. The countdown begins...

Hold on. I must adjust my watch. So does the person beside me.

The person behind us tuts. I won't start until… yes! Connection established, I'm off.

In the mele, it's challenging to spot a person without a wearable on it. And it's not just us athletes who wear them.

This is a booming, massive sector. Names like Apple Watch dominate, each with an broad array of diverse models to cater to a spectrum of budgets. According to how high tech the watch you go for, prices can start from an affordable sum to thousands of pounds.

"I find it infuriating, I'm unable to relax."

"It provides solace… It feels like a companion guiding me."

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

A small sample of the responses I've had from like-minded tracker enthusiasts when I ask what they their opinion is on theirs.

The Data Dilemma

My current opinion on mine? Right now, irritating. It's telling me I'm not hitting my target, making me wonder whether the trees I'm running below are blocking my location tracking.

Countless individuals of us attach these compact monitors onto our wrists and use them all day and night, ostensibly at ease with the fact they're constantly recording us.

A distant memory are the days when we depended on them solely to give us an rough count of our daily steps. Today, they can analyse our sleep patterns, blood pressure, oxygen saturation, our recovery score.

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

But can they do what they claim to do? And are the numbers we obsess over a true reflection of the truth? Do they boost our mental and physical wellbeing, or do the multitude of measurements and constant notifications just increase our daily stresses?

A Love-Hate Relationship

"I become a a little fixated with mine," a wearer confesses.

While she values how her device tracks her workouts, she finds some of its other functions "excessive" at times - a feeling first discovered during a major life event.

Prior to discovering she could put it into a specific mode, her smartwatch repeatedly informed her she was not being productive enough. In a new phase, the watch frequently reports her she's had a poor sleep score.

"I am caring for a six-month old, I don't need to be notified my sleep was poor," she says. "I know that perfectly well."

Is it not possible to just take it off?

"I suppose I could, I suppose, but I've got this love-hate relationship with it," she continues. "I love it for its fitness insights, I just wonder whether the additional features it can now do is possibly too much for me."

How Do They Work?

Every device of smartwatch has its own unique way of monitoring your vitals and processing your data, but the vast bulk use optical sensors on the underside of the watch.

They typically emit tiny, coloured LED lights onto your arm which can monitor pulsation, recording your BPM. Sophisticated devices measure changes in the bioimpedance that passes over the skin to get an idea of your nervous system activity.

The Professional Viewpoint

One expert says that overall for smartwatches, it's a "delicate equilibrium" - while the rapidly advancing tech could potentially save lives, "spotting abnormalities before we notice anything", it could also turn us the tracked into the "concerned but fine".

He points out that newer wearables can conduct tests like electrocardiograms (ECGs), which regularly monitor how stable the heart is. They can notify if someone is experiencing atrial fibrillation (AF), where there is irregular impulses in the heart causing an uneven pulse.

This does not necessarily indicate someone is on the verge of a heart attack, but it can give an preliminary indication they might be more susceptible of a stroke in the future.

But how to make sense of these readings is complex. The expert worries that as further capabilities are introduced, people may find it hard to fully understand their data.

"I have some doubts that being able to monitor so many metrics is such a beneficial thing," he says.

A clinical psychologist focusing on cardiology agrees. A study into the influence of wearable tech on a set of cardiovascular patients suggested a significant portion of those who were given devices to monitor their cardiac function experienced heightened worry and were "more inclined to use healthcare resources".

She noted a cycle with her patients - they spotted a worrying figure on their watch. They grew concerned. Their heart rate rose. They got more worried. They checked again, and their heart rate went up again.

"If we see data about ourselves that we don't really understand then, naturally, we are going to become concerned," the psychologist says. "We monitor, we check again - it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy."