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Everyone's optimising something, and almost nobody has measured anything. Before the supplements, the protocols and the programs, there's a simpler question: what's actually going on inside your body right now?
Here's the honest ranking of the tests that answer it, what each one costs, what it genuinely tells you, and which ones to skip.
3 criteria: clinical validity (does it measure or estimate), actionability (does the result change what you do), and cost per insight. We run 1 of the 6 at Beyond Rest and the #1 spot goes to your GP.
Unfashionable and unbeatable: lipids, glucose/HbA1c, thyroid, iron, vitamin D and the rest, bulk-billed or cheap, clinically validated, and directly actionable. If you haven't done bloods in the last 12 months, do this before anything on this list. Everything else builds on it.
This is the category we'd argue is most underused. Breath-by-breath gas exchange analysis, the same method exercise physiology labs use, measures what fitness apps only estimate: your actual VO2 max, your actual resting metabolic rate, and whether your body burns fat or carbs at different intensities.
Why VO2 max leads the list: it's one of the strongest single predictors of long-term health and mortality in the exercise science literature (Mandsager 2018, JAMA Network Open, found higher cardiorespiratory fitness associated with lower mortality with no upper limit). Grip strength and VO2 max outperform most biomarkers people pay far more to track.
A PNŌE test reads 21 biomarkers in a single session: VO2 max, resting metabolic rate, fat-vs-carb fuel use, breathing efficiency, heart-rate zones and a metabolic age estimate, and the output is a number set you can program against: real calorie targets (no more online-calculator guessing), real training zones, and a baseline to retest against after a block. It's why we use it as the measurement layer under recovery and body-contouring courses: if the numbers don't move, the protocol changes.
Available at Prahran and Collingwood in Melbourne and East Perth in Perth.
A DEXA scan measures fat mass, lean mass and bone density region by region, and it's the standard the cheap methods get compared against. Around $80-120 at imaging clinics in most Australian cities. If body composition is the goal (fat loss, muscle gain, menopause-era bone density), a DEXA at the start and end of a 12-16 week block beats every scale and every mirror.
The gym-floor machines estimate composition from electrical signals, and hydration, food and time of day all move the result. Honest verdict: poor for absolute numbers, acceptable for direction if you test under identical conditions each time. Free-to-cheap, and better than nothing. Don't panic over a single reading.
Rings and watches are directionally useful (sleep timing, resting heart rate trends, training load) and unreliable as verdicts; the sensors estimate, and a bad "readiness" score on a day you feel great is the tell. Use them for trends across weeks, never as a daily report card, and if the score starts running your mood, take the week off it. We wrote about the balance in our sleep guide.
Epigenetic (methylation) age tests are genuinely interesting science and an expensive way to learn something you mostly can't act on differently yet: the interventions that "lower" biological age are the same ones you already know (train, sleep, eat well, don't smoke). The evidence-backed proxies are cheaper: VO2 max (measured in a PNŌE session) and grip strength both predict long-term outcomes better than most consumer age tests. Spend there first.
Consumer gut microbiome tests (fascinating field, low actionability so far: the advice that comes back is "eat more fibre and plants," which you can do for free), consumer food-intolerance IgG panels (not supported by allergy bodies), and any test sold with a supplement subscription attached to the results.
The measured baseline for most people: a GP blood panel, a DEXA, and a PNŌE session. Roughly a week of appointments, and you now know your bloods, your body composition and your metabolism as measured facts. Retest the PNŌE and DEXA after each 12-16 week block; bloods annually or as your GP advises.
"Most of wellness runs on guessing and vibes. The whole reason we built testing into the centres is that a measured baseline changes every decision after it. If the numbers don't move, we change the protocol," says Nick Dunin, founder of Beyond Rest.
Start with a GP blood panel (the clinical foundation), then a metabolic breath analysis like PNŌE for VO2 max, resting metabolic rate and fuel use, and a DEXA scan for body composition. Together they replace guessing with measured numbers.
If you're making decisions about training, nutrition or fat loss, yes: it measures (instead of estimates) VO2 max, resting metabolic rate and fat-vs-carb burn across 21 biomarkers, and VO2 max is among the strongest predictors of long-term health in the exercise literature. Available at Beyond Rest Prahran, Collingwood and East Perth.
Breath-by-breath gas exchange: VO2 max, resting metabolic rate, fuel use (fat vs carbs) at different intensities, breathing efficiency, heart-rate training zones and metabolic age, 21 biomarkers in a single session.
Epigenetic tests are real science with limited actionability so far. VO2 max and grip strength are cheaper, better-evidenced predictors of long-term outcomes, and a measured VO2 max comes included in a metabolic breath analysis.
Bloods annually (or per your GP), PNŌE and DEXA at the start and end of each 12-16 week training or fat-loss block. Testing once tells you where you are; retesting tells you whether anything you're doing works.
Book a PNŌE session, bring your goals, and build the plan off your real numbers. PNŌE metabolic test at Beyond Rest.