I work in health technology. I am a techie. I am an early adopter. I have a Fitbit Sense 2, an Apple Watch, and a Garmin Fenix. I've given away countless older models of wearables and fitness trackers. But there's one wearable that never leaves my wrist -- my Whoop.

Whoop is a wearable unlike any other on the market. Most people, if they've even heard of Whoop, think it's for elite, power athletes. Founder Will Ahmed, even says:

Our origins are really in professional sports. We started working with the best athletes in the world when the first product came out. Two of our first 100 users were LeBron James and Michael Phelps.

If you start researching Whoop, you'll find articles that say:

• Sports Illustrated: "WHOOP 4.0: The Wearable Designed for Elite Athletes"

• The Verge: "Only athletes should give a whoop about Whoop"

• Men's Journal: "How Whoop Became the Fitness Tracker for the Athletic Elite"

• Wired: "It’s a wrist wearable aimed at fitness fanatics—pro and college athletes, CrossFitters and weekend warriors..."

And Whoop itself advances this notion. They sponsor athletes and include quotes from elite athletes on their website.

But as a 53-year old, overweight woman living the dream behind a desk, I'm here to tell you that Whoop is my favorite wearable.

Whoop only asks me to do one thing

So many wearables have step counters (ugh...don't remind me that my RV is only 41 steps long), alerts (yes, Fitbit, I know I haven't moved all hour, but I have another Zoom call starting), reminders (no, I haven't drunk any fluids since my cup of coffee at 6am), and questions (yes, Apple, I am going for a walk now). Overwhelming guilt! So many actions to take! Log this, record that.

Whoop is different.

It only asks me to do one thing every day: answer a few simple, customizable journal questions about the previous day, using a well-designed user interface, after I wake up. That's it!

Whoop does everything else on its own. It calculates when I went to sleep. It calculates when I woke up. It calculates that I went back to sleep after reading a book at 3am for 45 minutes. And when I'm really awake, it calculates a score called "Recovery". It even notices that I took a nap!

And if I do some activity that gets my heart rate going, Whoop takes note and records an activity. (But I will get better results if I start/stop an activity on my own.)

But wait...there's more...Whoop also knows that I had a particularly stressful day because my CEO asked me to transform to Superwoman in an hour when I left my cape at the last campground.

And activity + stress = a Strain score.

But why does one action translate into my favorite wearable?

Because it starts with sleep. You see, Whoop assigns a color to my recovery (aka sleep): red, yellow, and green. And green is good, right? So how do I get more of that??? Well, I decided to experiment. I customized that journal to ask me some questions that I thought might be causing my sleep to be red or yellow. Questions like:

• Did the dogs sleep in bed with me?

• Did I drink any alcohol? If so, how many drinks?

• Did I meditate?

• Did I take melatonin?

• Did I work late?

• Did I watch TikTok videos until midnight?

And I answered those journal questions every morning. And a month later, Whoop sent me a Monthly Performance Assessment. I learned that reading my Kindle in bed (versus looking at my phone) had a Positive Impact -- my recovery was 5% better. And drinking alcohol had a Significant Negative Impact -- my recovery was 15% worse.

And you guessed it, before long, I was making healthy changes. The dogs now sleep on the floor (except when Jackson sneaks into the bed in the dead of night). I reduced my alcohol consumption. I read instead of looking at my phone.

Whoop isn't judgmental.

The language is coaching and encouraging. The Weekly Performance Assessments tell me that my Strain and Sleep were "recovery focused" -- meaning that my body was primed for performance. "This is an ideal time to work out." It doesn't say "You had zero workouts last week." It says "Your bed and wake times varied by an average of 1:25 hours, resulting in poor consistency. Focus on consistent bed & wake times to get back on track."

Whoop is well-designed.

Don't like wearing something on your wrist? Fine, remove the band and put it in the band of your underwear. Or your bra band. Or your leggings.

5 LEDs and 4 photodiodes capture data more often than most wearables, which leads to better accuracy.

No display. No blinking lights. No buzzing alerts (unless you choose to set the alarm). No beeping phone alerts. And all of that translates to a long battery life.

But when the battery does get low? The waterproof battery slides on the band to charge it while you're wearing it.

Speaking of bands -- lots of colors and designs to meet your personal design aesthetic.

And the downsides?

Of course, there are always a few of those.

Some people say the cost. A subscription ranges from $20 to $30 a month. However, this is offset because you get the device for free with a subscription. I believe that most people into health data will upgrade every two years or so, so that math works out roughly equal.

If you do want to know the time or have other smartwatch features, you might end up wearing two devices. I do. I wear a Garmin on the left arm (which is necessary for the app that I market) and my Whoop on the right arm.

Limited data integration. Until this year, Whoop was a closed system -- no external data integrations. This is changing rapidly. Whoop rolled out integrations with Apple Health, Strava, Training Peaks, and Equinox+. And more importantly, they introduced the Whoop Development Platform, opening the door to more integrations.

So even though I'm not the six-time CrossFit Fittest Woman in the World (my hero -- Tia Toomey!), I contend that Whoop is the best wearable on the market.

A wearable that is easy to use, gives you actionable data, and provides positive coaching is a winning device for anyone who is interested in improving their health and well-being.

In case you're wondering, I am not receiving any financial compensation from Whoop, nor do I represent Whoop in any way. I'm just a girl, standing in front of a wearable, asking it to help improve my health.

#whoop #unlockyourself #mobilehealth #mobilehealthtech