When in 2024 Will Smith, Rafa Nadal and Marc Anthony became team owners of the E1 Series, the first world competition for electric boats capable of rising above the water thanks to their underwater wings, it seemed like a nice experiment rather than a bet on the future. It's still a whim but it doesn't stop growing. And the sponsors are joining in. At its launch, the E1 Series consisted of nine teams: in addition to Will Smith, Nadal and Marc Anthony created their teams from the famous sea such as Tom Brady, Didier Drogba, Sergio Pérez and DJ Steve Aoki. The idea was born from the prolific mind of Alejandro Agag, the successful son-in-law of José María Aznar: co-founder and president since 2011 of Formula E, the first all-electric World Motorsport Championship, he launched the Extreme E in 2021 – something similar to Paris-Dakar – and this is his third project, now together with the engineer Rodi Basso, the designer Sophi Horne and the financial support of the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, which controls more than 700 billion of dollars. The first race was held in an inlet of the Red Sea in Jeddah on February 3, 2024 and the most recent, this July 18, with Drogba's team as the winner.
Two years after its premiere, the list of celebrities who bet on E1 continues to grow: in 2025 LeBron James, at the head of Team AlUla, and the Bolivian businessman Marcelo Claure with Team Brazil and in the 2026 season, Team Monaco – co-owned by businessman Chris Taylor and kite-ski champion Maxime Nocher – and Team Sierra, linked to the Ozmen family and its aerospace conglomerate Sierra Enterprises, have been added. The most popular 'converts' of 2026 have come from football and basketball. Thibaut Courtois, goalkeeper for Real Madrid and the Belgian national team, has become co-owner and global ambassador of the Sierra Racing Club through NXTPLAY Capital, the sports investment platform that he co-founded with businessman Gonzalo Vila. Just a few weeks later, Milwaukee Bucks power forward Kyle Kuzma joined the same project.
The 2026 calendar is made up of eight grand prix on four continents, starting in Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) and stopping in Lake Como, Dubrovnik, Monaco, Lagos, Miami and, for the first time, the Bahamas. The Monegasque event, held on July 18 in the waters of Port Hercule, also served as the premiere for Team Monaco, which took pole position in its fourth race as a team and whose trophy was won by Tream Drogba. Team Brady – the current two-time champion, owned by the former NFL quarterback and ex-husband of the top Gisele Bündchen – leads a classification whose red lantern is Team Rafa.
With twelve franchises as the ceiling planned by the organization and only two free places, E1 is close to exhausting its growth capacity in number of teams, although not in media impact: the series is already broadcast in more than 140 territories and has renewed its management leadership with Jamie Copas as the new CEO. It began as a curiosity of nine celebrities willing to get wet (literally) for the electrical cause. It has transformed into a consolidated circuit where they coexist with elite athletes and a lot of money in venture capital funds.
