How I Learned to Stop Worrying About Data and Love My Bike Rides

“Give us the Garmin, Hannah,” said James, a fellow journalist, extending his hand towards me expectantly. We were halfway through a week-long guided gravel cycling trip in the Galloway Forest in Scotland and Lakes District in England with adventure travel outfit Wilderness Scotland. I had made it a goal to try and focus on the riding rather than the numbers—no peeking at the mileage or elevation gain. But instead, I couldn't stop staring at my cycling computer. I was fixating on my pace, watching the elevation total tick up with every climb, and counting down the miles like I was racing an invisible cutoff.

James was just trying to hold me accountable. But it felt more like an intervention.

Admittedly, my relationship with data had gotten a bit out of hand. At first, my device—Garmin, smartphone, digital camera, whatever it is—was just a tool. It offered a way to plan my own routes (that’s the fun part) and stay prepared for weather or dwindling daylight. Even as a former backpacking guide, I still feel safer knowing the route details as I’m rolling along, including how far I’ve gone, how much climbing is left, and how long until the next turn.

But somewhere along the way, that awareness morphed into an obsession. I wasn’t just glancing, I was constantly checking. I’d verify the route even when I knew the path stretched straight for miles. I’d count down vertical feet (1k down, 2k to go!), analyze my average pace, and estimate how long the day would take. Once or twice, I backtracked just to hit a round mileage number for Strava.

On day two in Scotland, as we approached the biggest climb of our trip—a slow, steep, grind up chunky gravel—I found myself hunched over my handlebars, eyes locked on the dot on my Garmin. I barely registered the vibrancy of the greens around me, the smell of pine in the damp air.

I’m not the only one obsessed with my wearables. Now that nearly one in three American adults use a fitness tracker, many experts are starting to become concerned about the dark sides of individual data tracking. A 2019 study in BMC Psychology found that most participants felt anxious or frustrated when they were prevented from wearing their devices, while a 2023 meta-analysis in the Journal of Public Policy and Marketing found that while wearables improved motivation for some people, they also led to increased anxiety, guilt, and pressure.

Part of the reason these devices are so hard to quit is because they’re designed to keep us hooked. Like social media, fitness trackers tap into a psychological feedback loop: set a goal, receive instant validation, repeat. Hitting a daily mileage target or setting a new PR lights up our reward centers. This can be great for motivation, but miss a goal or break a streak, and you might feel like you’ve failed—even if your body needed the rest. Plus, according to a review published in Body & Society last April, the more we rely on those external cues to determine how hard to push, the harder it becomes to listen to our internal ones.

After coming to terms with my own data fixation, I have started to notice a larger backlash building, especially among everyday athletes hoping to reconnect with the simplicity that drew them to the sport in the first place. Some runners now swear by “naked runs,” leaving their GPS smartwatches at home and running by feel rather than pace. Even Apple has added a feature to its latest watches that lets you pause activity tracking, so you can take a rest day without breaking your streak. “The elite athletes are always going to be tied to technology, but I think that many people are becoming tired of it,” says Craig Kain, a psychotherapist and former lecturer in sports psychology at Cal State University.

For the first three days of my trip, I had missed out on the feeling I came to find. I had not gotten lost in my ride, where I could feel my legs churning on autopilot and the trail unfurling in front of me. I had not entered a flow state, the term used in psychology for the feeling of total immersion.

The flow state is elusive because it requires the right mix of challenge, skill, and presence—conditions that are surprisingly easy to interrupt, Kain tells me. But when it clicks, it feels almost trance-like, like everything is working in harmony and time doesn’t exist. “We're relaxed and we don't have that muscle tension, we’re just in that moment,” he adds. “The minute you look at the watch, you're out of the moment. The flow state is all about being present, and trackers can be a huge, huge distraction.”

Thinking about routes, pace, or elevation is a sure way to take yourself out of the present moment. In Scotland, though, I didn’t have to plan. I wasn’t burning my mental bandwidth on a million micro-decisions; I was in the hands of seasoned guides who handled the logistics before I even had time to think about them. (“Make sure you got a wee snack in your pocket”, Craig Tweedie, one of the guides, would remind us each morning.) Their quiet confidence made it easier—maybe even inevitable—for me to let go.

The landscape helped, too. The Galloway hills aren’t the jagged, dramatic bluffs you find in the Scottish Highlands. Their beauty is more subtle. Low-hanging clouds pooled in the folds of green hills, and forests of oak and pine pressed close to the trails. You had to actually look up from your bike every once in a while to notice the complexities. As Craig said: “The slower you go, the more you’re going to see.”

By the third day, I found myself glancing at the Garmin less often. Not watching each number tick by on a climb, but instead, feeling the rhythm of my breath and the crunch of gravel under my tires. As we crested a rise, the view opened up: golden beaches fringed the edge of Loch Dee, a rainbow expanded above. We hadn’t seen another soul all day.

Then, we dove into a descent. The fast, chunky gravel jolted my hands and rattled my teeth, forcing me to stay loose, to move with the bike rather than against it. We crossed a creek on a wooden bridge, and suddenly it felt like riding into a storybook: mossy rocks, a silver ribbon of water snaking through the trees, ferns along the water’s edge.

By day four, we’d driven down to England’s Lake District—a softer, pastoral contrast to the wilder Galloway hills. This is where I really found my groove. Rain rerouted us on part of the trail, so my GPS was useless anyway. (Cue brief panic, then unexpected relief.)

We followed the guides—one in the front, one sweeping the rear—along narrow bridleways through the national park. We fluttered our brakes to skirt around walkers bundled in tweed chore coats, dipped under low-hanging tree branches, and rattled past remnants of ancient stone walls from the Romantic Era when poets like Woodsworth called the region home. The light filtered through the beech trees, their branches spiderwebbing across the sky.

By day five, I had fully given in: I didn’t know how many miles we’d gone or how much climbing we had left. Frankly, I didn’t care. I still had the Garmin attached to my handlebars in case I got lost from the group and needed the map, but I dimmed the screen to the point where it wouldn’t pull focus. I could smell the faint grassy scent of a nearby sheep pasture, feel the cool air on my skin, and settle into the steady, contented rhythm of the ride. A farm dog greeted us as we moved from gravel to pavement. I didn’t want the day to end.

By the time I had returned home, I felt lighter, less tethered to the numbers. I haven’t ditched my devices—I still use them for some activities. Kain says the key is distinguishing between when you’re training and when you’re going out for the joy of it. So now, before I head out, I ask myself about my intentions. Most days, the answer is easy. I put the Garmin away, and let the miles disappear beneath me.