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An atmosphere of nervous excitement. Apparent is the chilled vapour exhaled by my competitors as they execute the "about to run" shuffle on the starting line.

A quick flick of the hips.

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

Wait a second. I need to start my tracker. So does the guy beside me.

The person waiting tuts. I won't start until… done! Connection established, away I go.

In the mele, it's difficult to find a arm without a smartwatch on it. And this extends beyond us participants who use them.

It's a explosive, massive sector. Companies like Apple Watch lead the market, each with an wide range of diverse models to suit a range of lifestyles. Based on how advanced the device you go for, prices can range from an affordable sum to thousands of pounds.

"It makes me crazy, I'm unable to relax."

"It reassures me… It's like a friend encouraging me."

"Stop telling me about a restless night."

Just some of the responses people have shared from other device users when I inquire what they feel about theirs.

The Monitoring Conundrum

My feelings on mine? Currently, frustrating. It's indicating I'm not hitting my target, causing me to question whether the overhead branches I'm running below are interfering with my satellite signal.

Countless individuals of us fasten these small gadgets onto our arms and wear them all day and night, ostensibly comfortable with the fact they're continuously tracking us.

Long past are the days when we relied on them exclusively to give us an idea of our step count. Currently, they can measure our sleep patterns, heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), our body battery.

It's difficult to find a bodily function they don't track.

But are they able to do what they advertise? And are the numbers we obsess over a true reflection of reality? Do they enhance our overall health, or do the plethora of readings and constant notifications just increase our daily stresses?

A Complicated Bond

"I do get a quite preoccupied with mine," one user confesses.

While she appreciates how her device records her runs, she finds some of its other capabilities "excessive" at times - a feeling first discovered during a pregnancy.

Before she realised she could adjust the settings, her smartwatch kept telling her she was failing to be active enough. Now, the watch keeps telling her she's had a bad night's sleep.

"I have a young baby, I don't need to be told I've not slept," she says. "I'm acutely aware all too clearly."

Is it not possible to just stop wearing it?

"It's possible, perhaps, but I'm in this complicated dynamic with it," she says. "I value it for its exercise data, I just wonder whether the additional features it can now do is perhaps excessive for me."

The Technology Behind the Tracking

Each model of smartwatch has its own proprietary way of monitoring your bodily functions and interpreting your data, but the vast bulk use optical sensors on the back of the watch.

They typically shine tiny, coloured LED lights onto your wrist which can detect capillary action, detecting your heartbeat. More advanced devices measure changes in the electrical current 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 rapidly advancing tech could potentially prevent illness, "identifying issues before we feel unwell", it could also turn us device users into the "concerned but fine".

He points out that the most advanced wearables can conduct tests like medical-grade monitoring, which continuously monitor how healthy the heart is. They can alert if someone is experiencing an irregular rhythm, where there is abnormal signals in the heart causing an irregular heartbeat.

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

But how to make sense of these numbers is not straightforward. The expert worries that as additional features are added, people may struggle to fully contextualise their data.

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

A professor focusing on patient behaviour echoes this sentiment. Research into the influence of wearable tech on a set of individuals with health issues suggested a significant portion of those who were given devices to monitor their cardiac function experienced greater stress and were "far more likely to use healthcare resources".

She observed a pattern with her patients - they saw a worrying figure on their watch. They became worried. Their heart rate rose. They got even more concerned. They looked a second time, and their reading rose further.

"When people are presented with stats about ourselves that we lack context for then, of course, we are going to become concerned," the psychologist says. "We look, we check again - it becomes a feedback loop."