August 1, 2025 • 53 mins
Could your fitness tracker be the unseen reason you're plateauing? In this episode, Dr. Taylor Waters, Ben Olliver, and Ryan Stevens break down what to track, what to ignore, and how fitness wearables either fuel elite performance or quietly hold you back. Covering HRV, resting heart rate, steps, calories, and sleep data, they reveal the essential metrics that actually drive change and the common ways people let the numbers control their behavior instead of guiding it.
Chapters
(00:00) Introduction
(03:08) Using Data to Drive Behavior Change
(06:11) Track for Consistency Not Precision
(08:56) When Wearables Become a Mental Crutch
(13:16) The Most Inaccurate Metric
(15:47) The Three Metrics That Actually Matter
(19:53) Mental Busyness vs. Physical Activity
(25:13) When to Ignore the Data and Trust Your Body
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
People who monitor their weight generally manage their weight
better. People who monitor their
calories generally monitor theirintake better.
People that have got newborns, they're like, oh like how do I
improve my sleep? You're not new for the next like
year. Monitoring sleep, so I had an
individual working 18 hours a day and he's look at his sleep
score. He was so bad.
We physically can't improve yoursleep because you're working 18
hours a day to launch a company.If you're just collecting data
(00:22):
and not doing anything with it, and not using it to make any
habit change or behaviour change, it's useless.
I'm Ryan Stevens. Doctor Taylor Waters, I'm Ben
Oliver. Welcome to the Superhuman show,
Yeah? What's up guys?
Welcome to the Superhuman Show with your host Ben Oliver, the
doc, Mr. Taylor Waters and Mr. MSC Ryan Ryan Stevens today
(00:43):
talking about wearable trackers.So I I have a garment, you've
got a Apple Watch. Apple Watch.
I got my phone. Got your phone?
Yeah. Oh, I'm that there, Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I count the steps. 59 They call
me Ryan Farah. This is this, this is a good one
because we, we, I don't want to say we, we recommend trackers to
(01:07):
our clients, but more so just for steps.
That's one of the, one of the main ones that we, we, we like
to use steps as a, a measure of need because it's very easy to
track. It's very cost effective to
track and it's quite a good metric just to see how much
someone is moving through the day.
It's not that any there's anything, I mean, I think
(01:28):
walking is fantastic, but it's not that.
That's the thing We're more justlooking at is this person
consistently moving the same every day?
And what typically happens when you when you diet or you go in a
calorie deficit, your body's response is to try and be a bit
more lazy to conserve energy. And if you're not tracking your
steps, what typically happens isthey will naturally go down,
(01:48):
your fidget less, you'll want tomove less because your body's
trying to again conserve energy.So by tracking it, we can either
increase it, you know, if we hita plateau, or we can at the very
minimum keep it the same. But then obviously with the
wearables that are available now, because it used to be like
a pedometer that you would have on your hip or like.
A like a shout out to Brian P. Yeah, Brian P.
(02:09):
Barrett as well. Barrett's a pedometer guy.
I. Love Barrett.
Yeah, I was chatting to him the other day.
He's great. He's good.
I guess the, so the other metrics that now we've got
access to because of like smartwatches and things are
resting heart rate, HIV, sleep quality, you know, not just
sleep hours, but sleep quality calories.
(02:30):
Burned. Calories burned and so I, I
think like, like the whoop straps as well, give you like a
recovery score, like a body battery kind of thing, will give
you recommendations on when to push, when to pull.
I, I think overall these things are net positive.
Cause cause like, again, you know, one of our key like
(02:53):
tenants is to use data to make informed decisions.
But the, that sentence is crucial.
It's like use the data like to make the decisions.
If you're just collecting data and not doing anything with it
and not using it to make any habit change or behaviour
change, it's useless. Like it's numbers for the sake
(03:14):
of numbers. The, the amount of times that I
see people, you know, they'll belike, oh, sleep score like 72.
And then it's like, oh, like my sleep score's not very good.
I said, well, what have you doneto try and improve it?
Nothing. It's just it, it like I'm
playing the lottery. I'm just rolling the dice and
seeing what it is today. And and then equally the like
the recovery score, the body battery, it's almost like
(03:37):
embedded suggestion where you wake up and you're like, I feel
great like I am ready to just crush my work out today.
Recovery score 20. You need to rest.
I do feel a bit tired today. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Or or vice versa. You wake up, you got a snotty
nose, you feel like shit. But my recovery score says 90.
Like I said it said I should overreach today.
(03:57):
I guess I got to go and, and people stop, they stop relying
on their like, like intuition, which again is when we, we spoke
about that of nutrition. Like intuition is normally
fucked up and that's why people should track their food because
your intuition has led to you gaining £50 / 10 years.
But you do have to listen to your body to some extent.
(04:21):
You can almost use it as a like an excuse not to like go to the
gym or go for a walk, but those same people, they'll still go to
like work or go out in the evenings or whatever, you know
what I mean? So it's almost like they'll give
themselves a reason not to do the things that are going to
move them closer to their goals,you know?
It's like it's the some of the key behaviour change techniques
that we use are self monitoring of behaviour and self monitoring
(04:44):
of outcome. And that's what it is.
But it's, it's a behaviour change technique that you can
use to change behaviour. And sometimes you do.
It's like if you start monitoring your steps, suddenly
you start to actively. Try and as an awareness problem.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's just like people who monitor their
weight generally manage their weight better.
Yeah, people who monitor their calories generally monitor their
(05:06):
intake better. So it's like they, they can be
used very well, but if you have no intention of actually making
any change on off the back of monitoring that outcome, well
then it's like, well, now you'rejust going to look at the
outcome and go, Oh yeah, there we go.
It is, it is what it is. And it's like, well, now you're,
if anything, you'd just be better off ditching the
monitoring and just living, living in, in bliss.
(05:29):
Well, I don't even have to look at it.
And that's it really. Like if you look at it like from
what you said, data is just neutral.
Is the person looking at how they use it?
Yeah, that's what. And you can, you know, if we, if
we really want to go into like the technicalities of it,
because people will stress over,they'll say, well, I've been
wearing my Garmin and like I've been carrying my phone with me
and this says I've done 8000 steps, but this says I've done
(05:51):
6000. Which one's right?
And I'm like, I don't know, like, because no one's actually
counting your steps. And then it's maybe you did a
little shuffle in the kitchen and that counted it as a step
and that one didn't. The, the only thing we're
relying on is can it's consistently measuring the same.
You're using the same tool, you know, no different than than
body weight scales. They're all calibrated slightly
(06:11):
differently. One might put you up £200, one
might put you at 2O2. And and then you'd say, well,
which one's right? You'd say neither, just use use
the same one because we're looking at the trend.
Trends and consistency, yeah. It's not the actual number that
we're interested in. It's the, it's the trend.
Is it going up? Is it going down?
The numbers are relevant. Because it's the same thing.
Like we're literally just talking with the heart rate.
Like mine doesn't take my heart rate because my tattoo
(06:32):
underneath and so randomly it will pick it up.
And so if I was using that to, you know, gauge my training
fitness or something, it's completely skewed because it
would just randomly jump in at random times or it's only
tracking half the beats. And I'm like, I can feel my
heart rate pulsing in my head after like a cardio session.
It's like at 90 beats a minute and I'm like, well that's
(06:54):
bullshit because I'm about to die.
But you're resting. Yeah, exactly.
There's a measurement error on that, I can tell you, yeah.
So like, but it's funny you do that because like, I, I know
elite endurance athletes that they'll finish a run and they'll
go and it's like they're still doing just the old scores that
we can't beat it. Like it's.
(07:14):
Like, you know, you do that for 30 seconds, double it, double
it. Now you put your heart rate for
the minute. There's no way I'm actually
counting that. But especially if I'm winded.
But the point being with that aswell is that people, people got
in phenomenal shape before wearables were available.
You know, you got Lance Armstrong when he was a kid,
(07:35):
destroying people, new smartwatches, then yeah, you
know, they, Yeah, something else.
They. Yeah.
That was PO baby. Much smarter, Yeah, Much better
than this bad. Boy, so more of the story.
Just trade in your Fitbit, EPO and some testosterone.
Save money on the Garmin. Yeah, but the yeah, I, I think
my my biggest not even gripe with them.
(07:59):
Just one thing to be aware of them is like, are you actually
using the data or is it paralysing your thought process?
Because you it, it's, it's almost causing you more stress.
It's almost like when you have clients who obsess over the, the
body weight scale and you know, oh, it's going up, it's going
down, it's fluctuating like, Oh,this is really frustrating.
(08:20):
And then you're like, cool, now let's have you stress over 5
more metrics like, and just get lost in these numbers.
And no different than embodies. Oh, like I did in, in body, it
said I've lost three 3 lbs of lean muscle.
Like why is this diet not working?
And I'm losing muscle and I'm like, you've added £20 to your
bench, like you haven't lost muscle.
But it like people will if, if you're not from a like a
(08:44):
scientific background or you, oryou just don't know about these
kind of tools enough, you don't understand how inaccurate they
can be and the, the, the pit falls to them.
And so you take the data as gospel and it's like, well, the
in body said I'm at 15% body fat, I want to get to 10 and I'm
like, I can see veins down your abs like you're not 15% body
(09:05):
fat. And so it's it, it can work with
you as a coach. It can also be a pain in the ass
when you have clients that are just so obsessed in the numbers
when they're even not doing the moving the big rocks and you've,
you've, you know, you're talkingto me about your HRV for the
last two weeks, but you haven't hit your calories for a single
(09:26):
day. You've done half of your
workouts, you drink alcohol and you stress it.
So it's like HRV is so far away from anything that we need to
even look at. But you're, you're obsessing
over this number as a means to kind of ignore the other, the
other big rocks, the other more boring, less novel rocks.
(09:48):
Like not overeating, Yeah. What you're actually looking to
do, you're looking to improve your behaviours in a way that
they relate to the goals that you have.
And it's like a perfect example of more like scale data we use
quite a lot. We take, you know, a weekly
average way, ideally 7 days. We take an average compare over
time and by looking at the the trend in scale data, we're,
(10:10):
we're trying to use that to inform what we do from a
behavioral standpoint. But like one of one of my guys,
he he's he hasn't got, you know,he doesn't want to be shredded,
but he wants to be in decent shape, but moreso just wants to
live a good lifestyle. Like he wants to be happy with
the lifestyle that he lives. He wants to give a good
impression to his kids. He wants to exercise.
He wants to eat well. But he also is from an Italian
(10:33):
American background. He likes those pizza stuff
stuff. Hardest pizza pasta.
Pasta. That's the hardest demographic
because their food is so delicious.
Yeah, and it's like ingrained inthat culture as well, isn't?
It Italian pizza, Yeah. And like in in Wales, we've got
cowl and cowl and lava. Bread.
Oh, it's alright. Can I leave that?
(10:53):
But no. So monitoring the scale data, he
wasn't using it to inform what he does from a dietary
standpoint. And it was pissing him off
because it's like, like, I wouldI get to the weekend.
I want to enjoy, I know this pizza because I've got this
party to go to and you know, my,my, my family are there and
we're going to have like, and I'm trying to cut it down.
I'm trying to eat a little bit less, but also I want to engage
(11:16):
in it. I'd get on the scale, I'm spiked
up. I'd get pissed off and I'd throw
the towel in on Sunday and then I'd end up just eating.
So now it's like you're monitoring data and it's
actually having a negative impact on the behaviour we're
trying to get. So it was like for him, I was
like, well, do you want to just not track it?
And he was like, yeah, there we go, Sam.
Yeah, since we haven't tracked, he literally hadn't tried like,
(11:36):
like religiously tracking data. He'll go like a month and he'll
still do some of these things, but his ability to get back in
the saddle is much, much better.He doesn't use it.
He doesn't annoy him. He's enjoying the process more.
He's training more consistently.He's tracking his diet way more
consistently, more accurately. But then it's like, oh, we might
step on the scale in like 2 months time.
Oh yeah, I'm down 4 lbs. Way better than what he was
(11:58):
doing before. And he's enjoying the process
more, which means he's going to deal a little bit longer and
better. So it was like, sometimes it's a
perfect example of like most people that I work with, I get
them to monitor scale data most because in general it has a good
effect on, on their behaviour. But for some people, it's like,
you have to look, what is this doing for us?
(12:20):
Is it saving the job that it's supposed to if it's not been
wrong? I find so I've had a similar
experience with like monitoring sleep.
So I had an individual who was like working 18 hours a day and
he'd look at his sleep score. He was so bad and I'm like, you
were just going to work even more.
Like you got a bad sleep score. Like we know your sleep is bad.
Like I can tell you that just like you know, like you know
when you're tired, you. Only go to bed for three hours.
(12:41):
Yeah, I can tell. You and you know, it's like we
physically can't improve your sleep because you're working 18
hours a day to launch a company.So let's just not.
And you're not willing to change.
That, yeah, yeah. And that's it.
So it's like just don't track it.
Launch a company. We'll sort the sleep stuff
later. Same thing with like, you know,
people that have got newborns, they're like, oh, like how do I
improve my sleep? And it's like, you're not going
to, for the next like year. Yeah, you, you chose to have a
(13:01):
child. So, so we, So what we do is we
adjust your plan to, you know, factor that in.
So, you know, we're probably notgoing to push the gym workouts
crazy hard or the calorie deficit really hard whilst
you're continually fatigued. It's like we're just going to
ease back a little bit or even go into maintenance, you know,
for a, for a little bit. But I, I think the 11 metric
(13:26):
that all of these trackables give you is like a, a calorie
burn, like a calorie expenditure.
And that's the one which is the most inaccurate.
And I, I've got the perfect client to, to show this.
And I, because I use this when, when we onboard new coaches,
because the, the software that we use, because it syncs up with
the smartwatches and stuff, it shows you the calorie intake
(13:50):
that synced up from My Fitness Pal versus what they're Garmin
or what just kind of giving themas an output.
And I said it's a really poor graphic to use to give feedback
to clients because it, it's, it's not accurate.
And if they're using that as well, my watch is telling me I'm
burning this much, why am I not losing weight?
And then you have to say becauseyou're not burning that much.
(14:10):
And so we, we know that if you, you can track your food very,
very accurately with what we have available now with
MyFitnessPal, the, you know, food labels, you know, they have
to be within a certain margin tolegally put it on the, on the
food. We've got weighing scales, you
know, which are pretty accurate.We can track intake very, very
(14:31):
well. And then you've got your watch,
which is essentially basing off,you know, movement and heart
rate to calculate this expenditure, maybe some stats as
well, if you put in your height and weight and stuff.
But then the this, this client, I, I use him as an example when,
when I'm on board coaches is hiswatch will on average tell him
(14:52):
he's burning 4000 calories a dayand his current calorie target
is 2600. And then I pull up his weight
chart and I said, he's been within 1 LB of his body weight
this whole time. So you tell me what, which one
is incorrect, his intake or his output?
And so there's a, it's a uselessmetric to use other than
(15:14):
consistency. Like if you're just, if you're
looking at the expenditure from a, I'm going to try and get this
number the same. It's, it's not an accurate
number, but then you could say, well, you could equally use
steps because that's, that's pretty much the, the same thing.
And so I, I, I, I really like, like my top three metrics that I
would track. Like, I would have a fourth one
(15:35):
as like an optional would be calorie intake, which is manual.
You know, you do have to track it yourself, steps and body
weight. And then the only other one,
which I may want to look at overtime is resting heart rate.
Because if, if you're, if you'regradually improving your overall
aerobic fitness, that resting heart rate will likely go down.
(15:58):
But you know, having said that, if suddenly, you know, average,
average heart rate, resting heart rate is going down.
You get to the end of a diet. Now you're using more
stimulants, you're drinking morecaffeine, you're using a couple
monsters, you're chewing nicotine, your average heart
rate might go up. Maybe you've now had a newborn
and your sleep starts to suck, average heart rate starts to go
up. So like that, that's quite a
(16:18):
useful one to look at kind of overall kind of stress and
fitness with a long term trend because it's going to fluctuate.
You know, if you, if you're overreaching on your training,
your, your average heart rate isgoing to go up.
There's loads of variables that go into it.
So that's kind of like a maybe. But those, those three, because
the, the reason why I really like steps, you know, even if
(16:40):
you're using a, a pedometer is, you know, before we, before we
used to track steps, you would give someone specific cardio,
like 30 minute walk, 30 minutes on the treadmill post training,
an hour fasted walk in the morning, whatever it is.
And people would do it. But the problem is, is that now
you're not monitoring what they're doing for the rest of
the day. So if I could be really active
(17:02):
through my day, but now my coachhas given me an hour of cardio
in the morning and I'm a bit more tired and then I start
sitting down on my ass the rest of the day.
The calories burn in that hour isn't making up for the fact
that now I'm moving less for theremaining 8 hours of the day.
And I'd almost be better saying we'll do a 30 minute walk but
keep moving through the day. But just by tracking steps, we
(17:23):
can monitor that movement ratherthan saying to someone like,
don't be lazy. It's like you're naturally gonna
be lazy. So it's good to attach a number
to it being like, look, we can see that you're moving less for
a day. Yeah, I want you to try and keep
this more consistent. I had that with an endurance
athlete, was gaining weight whenwe were trying to drop a little
bit of body fact, like I'm doinga 2 hour session like and I'm
(17:44):
not dropping it, is it? Yeah, but yeah, not moving the
rest of the day called. It like the the sedentary
athlete, you know, It's like youtrain your ass off for 2-3 hours
a day and you do fuck all for the rest of the day.
Like basically us myself. Like we like you, you know, you
go to the gym, you do your cardio or whatever, but then
you're your overall NEAT is pretty low.
Whereas when I'm not doing cardio in the gym, my Neat's
always a lot higher because I'vegot more energy.
(18:06):
I want to go out and go for walks and stuff.
If I've done like an hour conditioning session after my
weights, it's like my legs are fried.
I don't want to get for a week. Like I'm I'm exhausted.
It's like if you do a 2 hour session and then you accurately
track the calories burned in that one and then you're you're
awake for 12 and you do 10 hoursof walking, I can guarantee
you're going to burn so much more walk in those ten hours.
You know what? I.
Mean like you would look at. You would look at, say, one of
(18:27):
my gym sessions where I might lift for 45 minutes and then run
for an hour, and it's like, oh, he trains a fair whack.
He burns a load of cows. Then I go inside, have a shower,
sit at my desk and work for 10 hours, and then my day's done.
So but then you look at, say, mybrother, who might not train,
but then he's a Carpenter. So he's on his feet all day.
(18:50):
He's moving doors, he's fit indoors, he's hammering, he's
sawing, he finished his work. Then he goes, plays golf.
So on his feet again for anotherfew hours.
Then he goes home. So it's like he if he told him
what, golf's not hard. Golf's just just swinging a club
going for a walk. All right, he's in work great.
But it's like he probably burns way more than I burn.
But if you watched my that one, that two hours, you'd be like,
(19:12):
oh, he he must burn loads. But yeah, it's it's, it can be
misleading. Massively it's good for
awareness because people again, when we onboard clients, you
know, we ask, you know, how active are you during the day?
Are you on your feet all day? Do you work in an office?
And a lot of times people say, Oh no, I'm really active.
I'm always I'm always on my feet.
And then you look and it's like your steps are 4000 a day.
Like you're not objectively, you're not that.
(19:33):
If we're using 10,000 as like a,I would, I would say 10,000
steps a day. You're, you're moderately
active. Yeah, not super active, but like
you, you're moving. Yeah.
And then you realise they're doing half that.
It's like you're not as active as you think you are.
And that's probably why you're you're stalled.
Do you know what's huge as well in terms of like perceived
activity is you? I see this a lot, especially
(19:55):
with our sort of clientele, but also like with with mums who are
with their kids and stuff all day is.
They're mentally busy, so they've got a lot on their mind
there. They've got to plan the food
shop, they've got to make sure the kids are ready for school.
They've got to drop them to school.
They've got to get home. They got to sort the house out,
they got to pick things up and they're like, oh, and then you
(20:17):
ask them, are you active? I'm so active.
I'm on the go all day. You put a step tracker on them
and it's like you're 3 1/2 thousand steps, like you're
actually sedentary, but you're, because you're on the move,
you're on the go. You, you feel like you're being
very active, but it's actually, you're just mentally active.
You're not actually physically moving at all.
You actually spend a lot of timesat down doing nothing.
(20:38):
But like most people don't know,they overestimate how much
activity they do and and the report how much food they eat.
And that's that's where you go gain weight.
Yeah, they're, they're very useful from a, you know, because
you don't have to do anything like put it on your wrist, leave
it on there all day and it will track your steps and stuff.
Like I think that's awesome. Like we're not having to count
(20:59):
steps or anything, even with food, even with food intake.
You won't get much else done you.
Know even with food intake, likeyou still manually have to do it
to an extent, whether you're following a meal plan, you have
to be aware of, you know, weighing out your portions or
whatever. If you're using my fitness
power, you're, you're scanning barcode searching food, you have
to do something. Whereas with steps and things
like that, you know, you just keep it on your wrist.
(21:20):
I think the like the the recovery aspect doesn't like the
body battery and stuff like my body battery's been like 10 for
like the last two months, but I've improved like my training's
improved like continuously you. Look right, so nicotine solves
that problem. Yeah, it's just stem your way
out of it. But like, again, it's like I'm
going to look at, well, how do Iactually feel?
Like, do I feel sore? Am I motivated to train
(21:44):
objectively? Am I improving in the gym?
Like are my sets and reps going up?
Like is my recovery better? Like, am I able to push harder
on my aerobic stuff? So, you know, you don't need a,
a wearable for that. So I, I think like, are they,
are they essential for progress?Absolutely not.
Can they be really a really, really useful tool?
Yes. Can they be a detriment?
(22:08):
Absolutely. Yeah.
So again, it's like using the right tool and the right data
for the for the right job. And for some clients, they might
be data junkies to their detriment to others.
We need a load of data. If you're working with an
endurance athlete like we need, you know, you're working in
different zones for different training effects.
You know, you're, you're lookingat, you know, some of them have
(22:29):
got GPS on so you can track mileage and stuff like very
accurately like that stuff's really, really useful.
But for for general body composition change like body
weight, steps and food intake. So you use an activity track?
It's steps, yeah, yeah. You can use those 3 and get in
phenomenal shape and equally youcan get in great aerobic shape
(22:52):
and all of those other things without using those monitors.
Again, people got in shape before they before they were
around. People monitor with like aerobic
stuff is like you can just monitor minutes and you can
monitor perceived effort. There's no no no tracking needed
there. How long did I go and how hard
did I find it? Because even if you're, if
(23:13):
you're working in heart rate zones for like, you know, zone
2, zone 3 or whatever, if you had, you know, a really strong
coffee before you trained, like you're going to be in zone 3
when you're probably perceived effort as zone 2.
Like it's quite easy. And so yeah, like I, I really
like perceived effort for, for that.
But then equally that's got its downfalls where someone's
(23:35):
perceived effort could be like, oh, it's really hard.
But then I'm like, your heart rate's like 90.
Like you're not, you're not evenin zone 2 yet.
So. You've got some good music in
the headphones and you feel great when actually you're
you're gunning it and you need to step it back a little.
Bit so like there's there's so many it depends.
And it it again, like we we saidin a previous podcast, like it's
not a one-size-fits-all. There's going to be certain
(23:58):
tools for certain jobs, there's going to be certain metrics for
certain clients. But I think that, you know, the
first thing people do is, you know, they get a whoop strap or
an or ring or something like I'mgoing to track all of this stuff
and I'm going to, I'm going to, you know, biohack my way to, you
know, being the best person ever.
And it's like, but you're not even willing to track your food.
It's like the only reason you like it is because it does it
(24:19):
all for you and you're not having to do anything.
Yeah, but equally, without behaviour change, it's useless.
Yeah. Yeah.
It's you. You, you said it earlier with
with sleep, like I, I like data,but I can obsess over data as
well. I can once I start going down a
rabbit hole, I can start to overovercook it.
So I find I have to find that balance between monitoring
(24:42):
enough that keeps me motivated and allows me to make informed
decisions, but then doesn't actually start to have a.
Negative. Effect, yeah, a detrimental
effect on what I do. And like one of the things is so
sleep, for example, like I, I don't monitor my sleep because
if I was monitoring my sleep, I would be lying in bed awake
(25:04):
thinking about. Oh God, that sleep score's going
to be poor tomorrow. And so now it's having a
negative effect on my sleep because I'm thinking about
trying to get to sleep because the sleep score is going to be
bad. And then if the sleep score's
bad, how am I going to feel doing work and how am I going to
feel in, in the in the gym? And then similar from a recovery
score standpoint. A big part of the reason why I
(25:25):
train is because I like. It so.
If I wake up and it's like, oh, you, you shouldn't train today.
I'm like, oh what? Like this is the only good part
of my day today and I can't evendo it.
Yeah, that's like my me time. And then my my watch is telling
me I can't go because of my recovery.
School have an active recovery day and it's like fucking chest
day baby and then you. Like, yeah.
(25:47):
And then that's going to know you even more.
And I'm, I'm even more, yeah. The next, the next day, I'd be
like, you were stressed yesterday, yeah, because you
didn't let me fucking train. There's a negative cycle.
Yeah, I've trained in two. Weeks.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, oh gosh, my if I went off
my sleep score, if I had when I wouldn't have trained 2 years
ago, Yeah. Yeah, you'd be in recovery for a
(26:07):
while. Yeah.
So like right, right tool for the right job.
But overall, I think. They're net tool, Right job,
right person, yeah. Yeah.
And you know, if, and This is why, you know, working with a
coach can be very beneficial to say like, hey, don't worry about
this data. Focus on this data or we don't
even need to look at this yet orwe are going to look at this in
this training phase or or whatever.
(26:29):
But yeah, I I think they they can be a nice addition, but
absolutely not not essential. Awesome bit of a short 1 today,
but I think we've we've really covered covered everything,
everything with the with the wearables.
Wear them at your own peril. Awesome.
Thank you as always guys. Be sure to like and subscribe on
iTunes, Spotify and YouTube and see you next time.
(26:49):
If you love this show, please like, share and leave us a five
star review so that we can help more people.
I'm John Matson, reminding you to always go get what's yours.
(53:06):
If you love this show, please like, share and leave us a five
star review so that we can help more people.
I'm John Matson, reminding you to always go get what's yours.
People who monitor their weight generally manage their weight
better. People who monitor their
calories generally monitor theirintake better.
People that have got newborns, they're like, oh like how do I
improve my sleep? You're not new for the next like
year. Monitoring sleep, so I had an
individual working 18 hours a day and he's look at his sleep
score. He was so bad.
We physically can't improve yoursleep because you're working 18
hours a day to launch a company.If you're just collecting data
(00:22):
and not doing anything with it, and not using it to make any
habit change or behaviour change, it's useless.
I'm Ryan Stevens. Doctor Taylor Waters, I'm Ben
Oliver. Welcome to the Superhuman show,
Yeah? What's up guys?
Welcome to the Superhuman Show with your host Ben Oliver, the
doc, Mr. Taylor Waters and Mr. MSC Ryan Ryan Stevens today
(00:43):
talking about wearable trackers.So I I have a garment, you've
got a Apple Watch. Apple Watch.
I got my phone. Got your phone?
Yeah. Oh, I'm that there, Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I count the steps. 59 They call
me Ryan Farah. This is this, this is a good one
because we, we, I don't want to say we, we recommend trackers to
(01:07):
our clients, but more so just for steps.
That's one of the, one of the main ones that we, we, we like
to use steps as a, a measure of need because it's very easy to
track. It's very cost effective to
track and it's quite a good metric just to see how much
someone is moving through the day.
It's not that any there's anything, I mean, I think
(01:28):
walking is fantastic, but it's not that.
That's the thing We're more justlooking at is this person
consistently moving the same every day?
And what typically happens when you when you diet or you go in a
calorie deficit, your body's response is to try and be a bit
more lazy to conserve energy. And if you're not tracking your
steps, what typically happens isthey will naturally go down,
(01:48):
your fidget less, you'll want tomove less because your body's
trying to again conserve energy.So by tracking it, we can either
increase it, you know, if we hita plateau, or we can at the very
minimum keep it the same. But then obviously with the
wearables that are available now, because it used to be like
a pedometer that you would have on your hip or like.
A like a shout out to Brian P. Yeah, Brian P.
(02:09):
Barrett as well. Barrett's a pedometer guy.
I. Love Barrett.
Yeah, I was chatting to him the other day.
He's great. He's good.
I guess the, so the other metrics that now we've got
access to because of like smartwatches and things are
resting heart rate, HIV, sleep quality, you know, not just
sleep hours, but sleep quality calories.
(02:30):
Burned. Calories burned and so I, I
think like, like the whoop straps as well, give you like a
recovery score, like a body battery kind of thing, will give
you recommendations on when to push, when to pull.
I, I think overall these things are net positive.
Cause cause like, again, you know, one of our key like
(02:53):
tenants is to use data to make informed decisions.
But the, that sentence is crucial.
It's like use the data like to make the decisions.
If you're just collecting data and not doing anything with it
and not using it to make any habit change or behaviour
change, it's useless. Like it's numbers for the sake
(03:14):
of numbers. The, the amount of times that I
see people, you know, they'll belike, oh, sleep score like 72.
And then it's like, oh, like my sleep score's not very good.
I said, well, what have you doneto try and improve it?
Nothing. It's just it, it like I'm
playing the lottery. I'm just rolling the dice and
seeing what it is today. And and then equally the like
the recovery score, the body battery, it's almost like
(03:37):
embedded suggestion where you wake up and you're like, I feel
great like I am ready to just crush my work out today.
Recovery score 20. You need to rest.
I do feel a bit tired today. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Or or vice versa. You wake up, you got a snotty
nose, you feel like shit. But my recovery score says 90.
Like I said it said I should overreach today.
(03:57):
I guess I got to go and, and people stop, they stop relying
on their like, like intuition, which again is when we, we spoke
about that of nutrition. Like intuition is normally
fucked up and that's why people should track their food because
your intuition has led to you gaining £50 / 10 years.
But you do have to listen to your body to some extent.
(04:21):
You can almost use it as a like an excuse not to like go to the
gym or go for a walk, but those same people, they'll still go to
like work or go out in the evenings or whatever, you know
what I mean? So it's almost like they'll give
themselves a reason not to do the things that are going to
move them closer to their goals,you know?
It's like it's the some of the key behaviour change techniques
that we use are self monitoring of behaviour and self monitoring
(04:44):
of outcome. And that's what it is.
But it's, it's a behaviour change technique that you can
use to change behaviour. And sometimes you do.
It's like if you start monitoring your steps, suddenly
you start to actively. Try and as an awareness problem.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's just like people who monitor their
weight generally manage their weight better.
Yeah, people who monitor their calories generally monitor their
(05:06):
intake better. So it's like they, they can be
used very well, but if you have no intention of actually making
any change on off the back of monitoring that outcome, well
then it's like, well, now you'rejust going to look at the
outcome and go, Oh yeah, there we go.
It is, it is what it is. And it's like, well, now you're,
if anything, you'd just be better off ditching the
monitoring and just living, living in, in bliss.
(05:29):
Well, I don't even have to look at it.
And that's it really. Like if you look at it like from
what you said, data is just neutral.
Is the person looking at how they use it?
Yeah, that's what. And you can, you know, if we, if
we really want to go into like the technicalities of it,
because people will stress over,they'll say, well, I've been
wearing my Garmin and like I've been carrying my phone with me
and this says I've done 8000 steps, but this says I've done
(05:51):
6000. Which one's right?
And I'm like, I don't know, like, because no one's actually
counting your steps. And then it's maybe you did a
little shuffle in the kitchen and that counted it as a step
and that one didn't. The, the only thing we're
relying on is can it's consistently measuring the same.
You're using the same tool, you know, no different than than
body weight scales. They're all calibrated slightly
(06:11):
differently. One might put you up £200, one
might put you at 2O2. And and then you'd say, well,
which one's right? You'd say neither, just use use
the same one because we're looking at the trend.
Trends and consistency, yeah. It's not the actual number that
we're interested in. It's the, it's the trend.
Is it going up? Is it going down?
The numbers are relevant. Because it's the same thing.
Like we're literally just talking with the heart rate.
Like mine doesn't take my heart rate because my tattoo
(06:32):
underneath and so randomly it will pick it up.
And so if I was using that to, you know, gauge my training
fitness or something, it's completely skewed because it
would just randomly jump in at random times or it's only
tracking half the beats. And I'm like, I can feel my
heart rate pulsing in my head after like a cardio session.
It's like at 90 beats a minute and I'm like, well that's
(06:54):
bullshit because I'm about to die.
But you're resting. Yeah, exactly.
There's a measurement error on that, I can tell you, yeah.
So like, but it's funny you do that because like, I, I know
elite endurance athletes that they'll finish a run and they'll
go and it's like they're still doing just the old scores that
we can't beat it. Like it's.
(07:14):
Like, you know, you do that for 30 seconds, double it, double
it. Now you put your heart rate for
the minute. There's no way I'm actually
counting that. But especially if I'm winded.
But the point being with that aswell is that people, people got
in phenomenal shape before wearables were available.
You know, you got Lance Armstrong when he was a kid,
(07:35):
destroying people, new smartwatches, then yeah, you
know, they, Yeah, something else.
They. Yeah.
That was PO baby. Much smarter, Yeah, Much better
than this bad. Boy, so more of the story.
Just trade in your Fitbit, EPO and some testosterone.
Save money on the Garmin. Yeah, but the yeah, I, I think
my my biggest not even gripe with them.
(07:59):
Just one thing to be aware of them is like, are you actually
using the data or is it paralysing your thought process?
Because you it, it's, it's almost causing you more stress.
It's almost like when you have clients who obsess over the, the
body weight scale and you know, oh, it's going up, it's going
down, it's fluctuating like, Oh,this is really frustrating.
(08:20):
And then you're like, cool, now let's have you stress over 5
more metrics like, and just get lost in these numbers.
And no different than embodies. Oh, like I did in, in body, it
said I've lost three 3 lbs of lean muscle.
Like why is this diet not working?
And I'm losing muscle and I'm like, you've added £20 to your
bench, like you haven't lost muscle.
But it like people will if, if you're not from a like a
(08:44):
scientific background or you, oryou just don't know about these
kind of tools enough, you don't understand how inaccurate they
can be and the, the, the pit falls to them.
And so you take the data as gospel and it's like, well, the
in body said I'm at 15% body fat, I want to get to 10 and I'm
like, I can see veins down your abs like you're not 15% body
(09:05):
fat. And so it's it, it can work with
you as a coach. It can also be a pain in the ass
when you have clients that are just so obsessed in the numbers
when they're even not doing the moving the big rocks and you've,
you've, you know, you're talkingto me about your HRV for the
last two weeks, but you haven't hit your calories for a single
(09:26):
day. You've done half of your
workouts, you drink alcohol and you stress it.
So it's like HRV is so far away from anything that we need to
even look at. But you're, you're obsessing
over this number as a means to kind of ignore the other, the
other big rocks, the other more boring, less novel rocks.
(09:48):
Like not overeating, Yeah. What you're actually looking to
do, you're looking to improve your behaviours in a way that
they relate to the goals that you have.
And it's like a perfect example of more like scale data we use
quite a lot. We take, you know, a weekly
average way, ideally 7 days. We take an average compare over
time and by looking at the the trend in scale data, we're,
(10:10):
we're trying to use that to inform what we do from a
behavioral standpoint. But like one of one of my guys,
he he's he hasn't got, you know,he doesn't want to be shredded,
but he wants to be in decent shape, but moreso just wants to
live a good lifestyle. Like he wants to be happy with
the lifestyle that he lives. He wants to give a good
impression to his kids. He wants to exercise.
He wants to eat well. But he also is from an Italian
(10:33):
American background. He likes those pizza stuff
stuff. Hardest pizza pasta.
Pasta. That's the hardest demographic
because their food is so delicious.
Yeah, and it's like ingrained inthat culture as well, isn't?
It Italian pizza, Yeah. And like in in Wales, we've got
cowl and cowl and lava. Bread.
Oh, it's alright. Can I leave that?
(10:53):
But no. So monitoring the scale data, he
wasn't using it to inform what he does from a dietary
standpoint. And it was pissing him off
because it's like, like, I wouldI get to the weekend.
I want to enjoy, I know this pizza because I've got this
party to go to and you know, my,my, my family are there and
we're going to have like, and I'm trying to cut it down.
I'm trying to eat a little bit less, but also I want to engage
(11:16):
in it. I'd get on the scale, I'm spiked
up. I'd get pissed off and I'd throw
the towel in on Sunday and then I'd end up just eating.
So now it's like you're monitoring data and it's
actually having a negative impact on the behaviour we're
trying to get. So it was like for him, I was
like, well, do you want to just not track it?
And he was like, yeah, there we go, Sam.
Yeah, since we haven't tracked, he literally hadn't tried like,
(11:36):
like religiously tracking data. He'll go like a month and he'll
still do some of these things, but his ability to get back in
the saddle is much, much better.He doesn't use it.
He doesn't annoy him. He's enjoying the process more.
He's training more consistently.He's tracking his diet way more
consistently, more accurately. But then it's like, oh, we might
step on the scale in like 2 months time.
Oh yeah, I'm down 4 lbs. Way better than what he was
(11:58):
doing before. And he's enjoying the process
more, which means he's going to deal a little bit longer and
better. So it was like, sometimes it's a
perfect example of like most people that I work with, I get
them to monitor scale data most because in general it has a good
effect on, on their behaviour. But for some people, it's like,
you have to look, what is this doing for us?
(12:20):
Is it saving the job that it's supposed to if it's not been
wrong? I find so I've had a similar
experience with like monitoring sleep.
So I had an individual who was like working 18 hours a day and
he'd look at his sleep score. He was so bad and I'm like, you
were just going to work even more.
Like you got a bad sleep score. Like we know your sleep is bad.
Like I can tell you that just like you know, like you know
when you're tired, you. Only go to bed for three hours.
(12:41):
Yeah, I can tell. You and you know, it's like we
physically can't improve your sleep because you're working 18
hours a day to launch a company.So let's just not.
And you're not willing to change.
That, yeah, yeah. And that's it.
So it's like just don't track it.
Launch a company. We'll sort the sleep stuff
later. Same thing with like, you know,
people that have got newborns, they're like, oh, like how do I
improve my sleep? And it's like, you're not going
to, for the next like year. Yeah, you, you chose to have a
(13:01):
child. So, so we, So what we do is we
adjust your plan to, you know, factor that in.
So, you know, we're probably notgoing to push the gym workouts
crazy hard or the calorie deficit really hard whilst
you're continually fatigued. It's like we're just going to
ease back a little bit or even go into maintenance, you know,
for a, for a little bit. But I, I think the 11 metric
(13:26):
that all of these trackables give you is like a, a calorie
burn, like a calorie expenditure.
And that's the one which is the most inaccurate.
And I, I've got the perfect client to, to show this.
And I, because I use this when, when we onboard new coaches,
because the, the software that we use, because it syncs up with
the smartwatches and stuff, it shows you the calorie intake
(13:50):
that synced up from My Fitness Pal versus what they're Garmin
or what just kind of giving themas an output.
And I said it's a really poor graphic to use to give feedback
to clients because it, it's, it's not accurate.
And if they're using that as well, my watch is telling me I'm
burning this much, why am I not losing weight?
And then you have to say becauseyou're not burning that much.
(14:10):
And so we, we know that if you, you can track your food very,
very accurately with what we have available now with
MyFitnessPal, the, you know, food labels, you know, they have
to be within a certain margin tolegally put it on the, on the
food. We've got weighing scales, you
know, which are pretty accurate.We can track intake very, very
(14:31):
well. And then you've got your watch,
which is essentially basing off,you know, movement and heart
rate to calculate this expenditure, maybe some stats as
well, if you put in your height and weight and stuff.
But then the this, this client, I, I use him as an example when,
when I'm on board coaches is hiswatch will on average tell him
(14:52):
he's burning 4000 calories a dayand his current calorie target
is 2600. And then I pull up his weight
chart and I said, he's been within 1 LB of his body weight
this whole time. So you tell me what, which one
is incorrect, his intake or his output?
And so there's a, it's a uselessmetric to use other than
(15:14):
consistency. Like if you're just, if you're
looking at the expenditure from a, I'm going to try and get this
number the same. It's, it's not an accurate
number, but then you could say, well, you could equally use
steps because that's, that's pretty much the, the same thing.
And so I, I, I, I really like, like my top three metrics that I
would track. Like, I would have a fourth one
(15:35):
as like an optional would be calorie intake, which is manual.
You know, you do have to track it yourself, steps and body
weight. And then the only other one,
which I may want to look at overtime is resting heart rate.
Because if, if you're, if you'regradually improving your overall
aerobic fitness, that resting heart rate will likely go down.
(15:58):
But you know, having said that, if suddenly, you know, average,
average heart rate, resting heart rate is going down.
You get to the end of a diet. Now you're using more
stimulants, you're drinking morecaffeine, you're using a couple
monsters, you're chewing nicotine, your average heart
rate might go up. Maybe you've now had a newborn
and your sleep starts to suck, average heart rate starts to go
up. So like that, that's quite a
(16:18):
useful one to look at kind of overall kind of stress and
fitness with a long term trend because it's going to fluctuate.
You know, if you, if you're overreaching on your training,
your, your average heart rate isgoing to go up.
There's loads of variables that go into it.
So that's kind of like a maybe. But those, those three, because
the, the reason why I really like steps, you know, even if
(16:40):
you're using a, a pedometer is, you know, before we, before we
used to track steps, you would give someone specific cardio,
like 30 minute walk, 30 minutes on the treadmill post training,
an hour fasted walk in the morning, whatever it is.
And people would do it. But the problem is, is that now
you're not monitoring what they're doing for the rest of
the day. So if I could be really active
(17:02):
through my day, but now my coachhas given me an hour of cardio
in the morning and I'm a bit more tired and then I start
sitting down on my ass the rest of the day.
The calories burn in that hour isn't making up for the fact
that now I'm moving less for theremaining 8 hours of the day.
And I'd almost be better saying we'll do a 30 minute walk but
keep moving through the day. But just by tracking steps, we
(17:23):
can monitor that movement ratherthan saying to someone like,
don't be lazy. It's like you're naturally gonna
be lazy. So it's good to attach a number
to it being like, look, we can see that you're moving less for
a day. Yeah, I want you to try and keep
this more consistent. I had that with an endurance
athlete, was gaining weight whenwe were trying to drop a little
bit of body fact, like I'm doinga 2 hour session like and I'm
(17:44):
not dropping it, is it? Yeah, but yeah, not moving the
rest of the day called. It like the the sedentary
athlete, you know, It's like youtrain your ass off for 2-3 hours
a day and you do fuck all for the rest of the day.
Like basically us myself. Like we like you, you know, you
go to the gym, you do your cardio or whatever, but then
you're your overall NEAT is pretty low.
Whereas when I'm not doing cardio in the gym, my Neat's
always a lot higher because I'vegot more energy.
(18:06):
I want to go out and go for walks and stuff.
If I've done like an hour conditioning session after my
weights, it's like my legs are fried.
I don't want to get for a week. Like I'm I'm exhausted.
It's like if you do a 2 hour session and then you accurately
track the calories burned in that one and then you're you're
awake for 12 and you do 10 hoursof walking, I can guarantee
you're going to burn so much more walk in those ten hours.
You know what? I.
Mean like you would look at. You would look at, say, one of
(18:27):
my gym sessions where I might lift for 45 minutes and then run
for an hour, and it's like, oh, he trains a fair whack.
He burns a load of cows. Then I go inside, have a shower,
sit at my desk and work for 10 hours, and then my day's done.
So but then you look at, say, mybrother, who might not train,
but then he's a Carpenter. So he's on his feet all day.
(18:50):
He's moving doors, he's fit indoors, he's hammering, he's
sawing, he finished his work. Then he goes, plays golf.
So on his feet again for anotherfew hours.
Then he goes home. So it's like he if he told him
what, golf's not hard. Golf's just just swinging a club
going for a walk. All right, he's in work great.
But it's like he probably burns way more than I burn.
But if you watched my that one, that two hours, you'd be like,
(19:12):
oh, he he must burn loads. But yeah, it's it's, it can be
misleading. Massively it's good for
awareness because people again, when we onboard clients, you
know, we ask, you know, how active are you during the day?
Are you on your feet all day? Do you work in an office?
And a lot of times people say, Oh no, I'm really active.
I'm always I'm always on my feet.
And then you look and it's like your steps are 4000 a day.
Like you're not objectively, you're not that.
(19:33):
If we're using 10,000 as like a,I would, I would say 10,000
steps a day. You're, you're moderately
active. Yeah, not super active, but like
you, you're moving. Yeah.
And then you realise they're doing half that.
It's like you're not as active as you think you are.
And that's probably why you're you're stalled.
Do you know what's huge as well in terms of like perceived
activity is you? I see this a lot, especially
(19:55):
with our sort of clientele, but also like with with mums who are
with their kids and stuff all day is.
They're mentally busy, so they've got a lot on their mind
there. They've got to plan the food
shop, they've got to make sure the kids are ready for school.
They've got to drop them to school.
They've got to get home. They got to sort the house out,
they got to pick things up and they're like, oh, and then you
(20:17):
ask them, are you active? I'm so active.
I'm on the go all day. You put a step tracker on them
and it's like you're 3 1/2 thousand steps, like you're
actually sedentary, but you're, because you're on the move,
you're on the go. You, you feel like you're being
very active, but it's actually, you're just mentally active.
You're not actually physically moving at all.
You actually spend a lot of timesat down doing nothing.
(20:38):
But like most people don't know,they overestimate how much
activity they do and and the report how much food they eat.
And that's that's where you go gain weight.
Yeah, they're, they're very useful from a, you know, because
you don't have to do anything like put it on your wrist, leave
it on there all day and it will track your steps and stuff.
Like I think that's awesome. Like we're not having to count
(20:59):
steps or anything, even with food, even with food intake.
You won't get much else done you.
Know even with food intake, likeyou still manually have to do it
to an extent, whether you're following a meal plan, you have
to be aware of, you know, weighing out your portions or
whatever. If you're using my fitness
power, you're, you're scanning barcode searching food, you have
to do something. Whereas with steps and things
like that, you know, you just keep it on your wrist.
(21:20):
I think the like the the recovery aspect doesn't like the
body battery and stuff like my body battery's been like 10 for
like the last two months, but I've improved like my training's
improved like continuously you. Look right, so nicotine solves
that problem. Yeah, it's just stem your way
out of it. But like, again, it's like I'm
going to look at, well, how do Iactually feel?
Like, do I feel sore? Am I motivated to train
(21:44):
objectively? Am I improving in the gym?
Like are my sets and reps going up?
Like is my recovery better? Like, am I able to push harder
on my aerobic stuff? So, you know, you don't need a,
a wearable for that. So I, I think like, are they,
are they essential for progress?Absolutely not.
Can they be really a really, really useful tool?
Yes. Can they be a detriment?
(22:08):
Absolutely. Yeah.
So again, it's like using the right tool and the right data
for the for the right job. And for some clients, they might
be data junkies to their detriment to others.
We need a load of data. If you're working with an
endurance athlete like we need, you know, you're working in
different zones for different training effects.
You know, you're, you're lookingat, you know, some of them have
(22:29):
got GPS on so you can track mileage and stuff like very
accurately like that stuff's really, really useful.
But for for general body composition change like body
weight, steps and food intake. So you use an activity track?
It's steps, yeah, yeah. You can use those 3 and get in
phenomenal shape and equally youcan get in great aerobic shape
(22:52):
and all of those other things without using those monitors.
Again, people got in shape before they before they were
around. People monitor with like aerobic
stuff is like you can just monitor minutes and you can
monitor perceived effort. There's no no no tracking needed
there. How long did I go and how hard
did I find it? Because even if you're, if
(23:13):
you're working in heart rate zones for like, you know, zone
2, zone 3 or whatever, if you had, you know, a really strong
coffee before you trained, like you're going to be in zone 3
when you're probably perceived effort as zone 2.
Like it's quite easy. And so yeah, like I, I really
like perceived effort for, for that.
But then equally that's got its downfalls where someone's
(23:35):
perceived effort could be like, oh, it's really hard.
But then I'm like, your heart rate's like 90.
Like you're not, you're not evenin zone 2 yet.
So. You've got some good music in
the headphones and you feel great when actually you're
you're gunning it and you need to step it back a little.
Bit so like there's there's so many it depends.
And it it again, like we we saidin a previous podcast, like it's
not a one-size-fits-all. There's going to be certain
(23:58):
tools for certain jobs, there's going to be certain metrics for
certain clients. But I think that, you know, the
first thing people do is, you know, they get a whoop strap or
an or ring or something like I'mgoing to track all of this stuff
and I'm going to, I'm going to, you know, biohack my way to, you
know, being the best person ever.
And it's like, but you're not even willing to track your food.
It's like the only reason you like it is because it does it
(24:19):
all for you and you're not having to do anything.
Yeah, but equally, without behaviour change, it's useless.
Yeah. Yeah.
It's you. You, you said it earlier with
with sleep, like I, I like data,but I can obsess over data as
well. I can once I start going down a
rabbit hole, I can start to overovercook it.
So I find I have to find that balance between monitoring
(24:42):
enough that keeps me motivated and allows me to make informed
decisions, but then doesn't actually start to have a.
Negative. Effect, yeah, a detrimental
effect on what I do. And like one of the things is so
sleep, for example, like I, I don't monitor my sleep because
if I was monitoring my sleep, I would be lying in bed awake
(25:04):
thinking about. Oh God, that sleep score's going
to be poor tomorrow. And so now it's having a
negative effect on my sleep because I'm thinking about
trying to get to sleep because the sleep score is going to be
bad. And then if the sleep score's
bad, how am I going to feel doing work and how am I going to
feel in, in the in the gym? And then similar from a recovery
score standpoint. A big part of the reason why I
(25:25):
train is because I like. It so.
If I wake up and it's like, oh, you, you shouldn't train today.
I'm like, oh what? Like this is the only good part
of my day today and I can't evendo it.
Yeah, that's like my me time. And then my my watch is telling
me I can't go because of my recovery.
School have an active recovery day and it's like fucking chest
day baby and then you. Like, yeah.
(25:47):
And then that's going to know you even more.
And I'm, I'm even more, yeah. The next, the next day, I'd be
like, you were stressed yesterday, yeah, because you
didn't let me fucking train. There's a negative cycle.
Yeah, I've trained in two. Weeks.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, oh gosh, my if I went off
my sleep score, if I had when I wouldn't have trained 2 years
ago, Yeah. Yeah, you'd be in recovery for a
(26:07):
while. Yeah.
So like right, right tool for the right job.
But overall, I think. They're net tool, Right job,
right person, yeah. Yeah.
And you know, if, and This is why, you know, working with a
coach can be very beneficial to say like, hey, don't worry about
this data. Focus on this data or we don't
even need to look at this yet orwe are going to look at this in
this training phase or or whatever.
(26:29):
But yeah, I I think they they can be a nice addition, but
absolutely not not essential. Awesome bit of a short 1 today,
but I think we've we've really covered covered everything,
everything with the with the wearables.
Wear them at your own peril. Awesome.
Thank you as always guys. Be sure to like and subscribe on
iTunes, Spotify and YouTube and see you next time.
(26:49):
If you love this show, please like, share and leave us a five
star review so that we can help more people.
I'm John Matson, reminding you to always go get what's yours.
(53:06):
If you love this show, please like, share and leave us a five
star review so that we can help more people.
I'm John Matson, reminding you to always go get what's yours.
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