Inside Tracker's testimonials and claims to expertise reveal that the service does nothing of practical value

Given the company's target audience, this would-be product shortcoming is no hindrance to sales

When I first learned about Inside Tracker, I admit that, largely because of some of the personalities associated with the enterprise, I started from the conclusion that it was complete buncombe, a feelgood-subscription for well-off dingbat-joggers, and filed a mental note to at some point work backward from there and hunt for evidence to support this conclusion. What kind of issues, after all, could a bunch of for-profit bloodwork analysts detect and solve that an ordinary medical provider, or merely an informed online citizen researcher with access to his or her bloodwork results, could not?

“This is clearly dumb; I’m going to find the proof,” however, is not the most rigorous application of scientific thinking. But it’s true that Inside Tracker’s entire set-up should trigger any runner’s bullshit detector on its face.

Blood tests can indeed reveal common abnormalities that affect regular runners such as anemia, the treatment options for which are clear. And a blood test is likely to include findings that explain why you’ve felt like shit warmed over lately on the run, such as a leukocyte (white blood cell) count of 35,000 or a glucose level of 27. But if you have cancer or severe sepsis, or are passing out every time you so much as blink, you’re probably already consulting a doctor and not shipping samples of your blood to “experts” you’ve never met and never will.

In other words, if you’re not running well because you’re sick, your bloodwork results, if relevant, will point toward a medical solution in established ways, and there’s no need for a lay outside opinion—even free ones, let alone opinions available only for purchase.

This reality seems to imply that Inside Tracker, if a legitimate operation, has an inside track on recognizing patterns or combinations of bloodwork values that an ordinary doctor, nurse practitioner, or physician’s assistant would not catch or even know to look for. For example, perhaps a high average level of iron per red blood cell (i.e., an elevated MCHC) combined with unusual biweekly fluctuations in serum potassium level within the normal range suggests a chronic myocardial inotropic limitation with resultant diminished cardiac output owing to altered cell-membrane ion-channel transport mechanisms in the presence of high-oxygen-affinity hemoglobin moiety, and that the subject’s calcium intake should therefore be increased. But probably not, because that’s pure medical word salad. All of the terms are real, but good luck making real sense of it. (I could be the Employee of the Month for any company operating a pseudoscientific scam, regardless of the intended consumer market.)

I looked at the company’s “Science” page, which states that Inside Tracker was conceived by a longevity expert and “is founded on the idea that combining rigorous, peer-reviewed science with cutting edge technology and the creative power of great human minds, can result in great advances for human well-being and performance.” I’m not sure why the last comma is there, but the same essential claim could be made by a professional psychic or astrologer, as, stripped of its flowery shitticisms, this garbledlyguck reduces to we believe our method works!

Under the heading “The proof is in the data,” this page links to the text of a study that, according to Inside Tracker, demonstrates the company’s “effectiveness in improving markers of wellness in healthy individuals.”

Here’s part of the abstract from that paper:

[A] longitudinal analysis was conducted on blood biomarker data from 1032 generally healthy individuals who used an automated, web-based personalized nutrition and lifestyle platform. The study had two main aims: to analyze correlations between biomarkers for biological insights, and to characterize the effectiveness of the platform in improving biomarker levels.

So the authors admit that they are not even assessing whether their data collection and analysis leads to improved athletic performance, or practical improvements in anything. They’re looking to see if they can improve “biomarker levels.” How this differs a Scientologist explaining what an e-meter does is unclear.

More from the abstract:

First, a biomarker correlation network was constructed to generate biological hypotheses that are relevant to researchers and, potentially, to users of personalized wellness tools.

Translation: The researchers looked at numbers in a longitudinal (over time) way and came up with ideas that might be useful to someone, somewhere.

The correlation network revealed expected patterns, such as the established relationships between blood lipid levels, as well as novel insights, such as a connection between neutrophil and triglyceride concentrations that has been suggested as a relevant indicator of cardiovascular risk.

In other words, the researchers found nothing new, even if they don’t admit or perhaps even see this. After all, how is something that has already “been suggested as a relevant indicator” also a "novel insight”? And are these guys playing doctor or are they trying to help some jocks?

Next, biomarker changes during platform use were assessed, showing a trend toward normalcy for most biomarkers in those participants whose values were out of the clinically normal range at baseline. Finally, associations were found between the selection of specific interventions and corresponding biomarker changes, suggesting directions for future study.

This seems to suggest that whatever “biomarkers” were off in study subjects returned to normal on their own during the period of data collection. It also seems to suggest that people exist who know how to issue useful corrective measures for known aberrations in bloodwork values, such as telling someone with grossly elevated BUN and creatine levels to go get at least one new kidney or at least stop drinking so much antifreeze. We already know about these people, even if we can no longer fully trust them, either.

I wasn’t going to try out any of Inside Tracker’s services for myself, so I can’t claim to be doing a product review here. But a review of the testimonials page reveals exactly what I expected: All the people praising Inside Tracker have nothing specific to say about how it supposedly improved their performance in whatever sport they do. Their praise gets no more granular than, “biomarkers were bad; Inside Tracker saw the problem and fixed it.”

But, as with David and Megan Roche’s Some Work, All Play “coaching” service, it’s the sources of these “testimonials” that the company wants viewers of the page—and I mean potential clients, not piss-takers—to make note of. You see, the people who run this company are swindlers at heart, but smart enough understand that their “science” doesn’t hold mist, much less water. They’re counting on raw virtue-signaling to attract precisely the kind of complacent flit-abouts who pay people a hundred bucks or more a month for broadcasting Wokish values and acknowledging their clients’ presence and exploits in crapcasts and social-media postings.

I’ll summarize Inside Tracker and its worthiness the same way I summarize the Roches’ “coaching” operation, as many of the same waterheads utilize both: It’s obviously nonsense and based on a combination of misunderstandings and poorly worded biomedical jargon, but this doesn’t mean it’s a scam in the eyes of someone who wouldn’t miss $500 a month if it blew away in the wind and whose values swing full shitlib.

Inside Tracker therefore functions in the same way a palm-reader to L.A.’s rich and famous does, with the output tailored to irritating joggers and other “outdoor enthusiasts” and people “avid” at stuff in which looking up at the sky is a frequent option. It’s something people can use in cities like Boulder to identify a fellow member of an especially wobbly-minded but very white-toothed tribe. which I suppose counts as a return on investment.