E1 Series: Why Will Smith, Tom Brady, LeBron James and other stars are running futuristic racing boat teams

CNN

25-03-2025

Will Smith, Tom Brady and Rafael Nadal dial in to a Zoom call. No, this is not the setup of a joke – in the star-studded world of E1, it's simply a regularly scheduled meeting of owners.
Launched in 2024 as the first ever all-electric raceboat championship, the E1 Series – partly bankrolled by the Saudi government-controlled Public Investment Fund (PIF) – boasts nine teams headed up by some of sport and entertainment's most recognizable names.
In Brady, Nadal, Virat Kohli, Didier Drogba and LeBron James – who launched a team ahead of the 2025 season – E1's ownership roster features all-time greats spanning American football, tennis, cricket, soccer and basketball respectively. Add in actor Smith and singer Marc Anthony, and their collective résumé has some impressive highlights.
Yet for Italian E1 CEO and co-founder Rodi Basso, it is not just the owners' reputations that make them so valuable to the fledgling 'sport and entertainment platform' – it's their combined '1.1 billion-strong' social media following.
Smith, for example, was in attendance at E1's most recent event, in Doha in February, sharing footage from the race weekend around the Qatari capital's Pearl Island with his 69.6 million Instagram followers.
His Westbrook Racing team finished fourth, with Nadal's capturing its maiden E1 victory, finishing ahead of teams headed by DJ Steve Aoki and football icon Didier Drogba respectively.
'As part of our agreement, they need to post before, during and after the race,' Basso told CNN.
'This (social) following for a newborn sport is an incredible number, and we know from our experience that of all the other sport platforms it took maybe five to 10 years to get anywhere near these KPIs (key performance indicators).'
Former NASA and Formula One engineer Basso founded E1 alongside chairman Alejandro Agag, the Spanish politician-turned-entrepreneur who launched all-electric motorsport championship Formula E in 2014.
Agag later invested in Seabird Technologies, a startup aiming to build boats that dovetailed electric propulsion with hydrofoil technology, which involves the use of wing-like structures under the hull.
Seeking someone to help make the vision a reality, in 2020 he contacted Basso, who – while serving as motorsport director at technology company McLaren Applied – had overseen the development of a lithium-ion battery that could power a Formula E car for an entire race without the need to stop.
Basso's answer came back the following day in the form of a proposal: 'Why not build Formula One electric on water?'
'I don't regret those days (in Formula One),' Basso said. 'At the same time, I realized that we cannot afford anymore to only rely on one source of energy which is fuel.
'I enjoy being part of, in an entrepreneurial way, this new journey which will be the base of future mobility, at least on water. I think it's a need – not a choice.'
With PIF funding secured, little over six months later, attention turned to creating the sport's vehicle. Enter Seabird's RaceBird, a boat capable of speeds up to 93 kilometers (58 miles) per hour.
Taking inspiration from birds gliding across water, Seabird founder Sophi Horne designed the 24-foot-long boat to leave significantly less wake when racing, by using hydrofoils that lift the hull above the water at speeds beyond 31 kilometers (19.5 miles) per hour.
Fewer waves could have a 'massive impact' on reducing coastal area erosion, argued Basso, who believes such technologies will come to serve as the cornerstone of sustainable marine transport.
'More than 50% of the population of the world live nearby water – lakes, rivers, oceans,' he said.
'We want to be part of the solution in order to make sure that a lifestyle near the water can be experienced for future generations.'
Those green goals could be undermined by the carbon emissions associated with transporting people and equipment to each race. F1 teams, for example, regularly use air travel to transport as many as 4,000 staff and 25 tons of essential cargo to race venues.
But Basso said that only between two and five percent of the total freight for an E1 race weekend travels by air, with the majority moved via shipping freight or on the road, adding that the number of staff traveling by plane has been reduced by 20% from the inaugural season.
He would also like to expand E1 so that the teams could have another set of powerboats, stored in Asia, for example, that would reduce the distances that boats are shipped between races.
'You can think of being in Miami one week, and after two weeks being in Singapore without having to ship everything around,' Basso said.
The long-term future of the championship still needs to be proven, however, after the premature ending of the inaugural season – in which three events on the original calendar never went ahead – and the fact this year's calendar has been shortened from seven planned races to five.
Lifestyle is 'first and foremost' for Basso when it comes to E1, with celebrity involvement a key factor in the sport positioning itself as a premium experience, with high-end hospitality in some of the world's most luxurious destinations.
Race locations for the 2025 season include Monaco, Italy's Lake Maggiore and Miami, with the celebrity owners often attending to watch their team's two pilots compete across a two-day event consisting of testing, free practice, qualifying and racing – much akin to Formula One.
'I have to pinch myself when I see a Zoom call together with Tom Brady, Marc Anthony, Didier Drogba, Rafa Nadal, Will Smith, Virat Kohli and all the others,' Basso said.
'We get fantastic insight on the sport proposition side … and also on the marketing and entertainment side. So for us it's an added value to also have them as advisors.'
It is currently an all-male ownership list, but Basso is confident a first female team owner will be announced before the season ends in Miami this November, adding that talks are underway with five candidates.
Each team's raceday duo must be composed of a male and female pilot. Spain's Cris Lazarraga posted the fastest lap time in both qualifying and races as she and fellow Team Rafa (Nadal) pilot Tom Chiappe won in Doha, a performance that Basso believes is testament to a boat design that rewards skill above all other attributes.
'I think we paid a toll for the legacy, or the old-style reputation, of powerboating (racing, which) was perceived in the past as maybe a male-driven sort of sport,' Basso said.
'This boat is very much an exercise in strategy … not driven by either muscles or any other forms of power and energy. So the playing field is very levelled, and the competition is very close.'