Remember when Formula E launched and brought the sustainability agenda to the world’s most-watched motorsport? Well, its founder, Alejandro Agag, is now doing it on water. It’s called E1 Series, and it runs on clean, electric and innovative RaceBirds: sleek competition boats that fly above the waters of the world’s most prestigious harbours. Last week, Living Sports was on the ground at E1 Series’ third-season showrun in Ibiza. What we witnessed is worth your next six minutes.
Founded by former Spanish diplomat Alejandro Agag and former former Formula 1 Ferrari engineer Rodi Basso, E1 Series was born in 2020 as the motorsport that would harness the electrification of marine mobility. Built on sustainability values, technological innovation and gender parity, it’s a radical departure from motorsport’s traditional approach. After four years of testing prototypes and investor backing, its first competitive season took place in 2024. We are now inside its third.
Agag is a name to remember: he’s a motorsports dealmaker in every sense. He brought Leonardo DiCaprio to co-found a Formula E team, and at E1, he’s scaled that celebrity model further. Tennis legend Rafa Nadal, NFL superstar Tom Brady and actor Will Smith are amongst a roster of patrons that spearhead the competition’s teams as team owners.
Even though their involvement is more cultural than technical - encouragement and leadership rather than pit wall coaching - the pull is undeniable. The stars’ impact on an audience and pilots alike is visible at the races, but also on social channels. A head-to-head sprint race between Rafa Nadal and Will Smith at Lake Como proved the point: celebrity spectacle clearly pays off in digital viewership.
Yet celebrities are not their only growth lever.
“Because we’re so young, we test and learn initiatives at every race”, CEO Jamie Copas told Living Sports.
From high-net-worth fans who travel to race weekends to digital audiences reached through TikTok Live creators and broadcast partners, each audience is approached tactically and differently by E1’s marketing and communications team.
What most clearly distinguishes E1 is the set of values it places at the heart of an industry historically shaped by combustion engines and male dominance. It is one of only two competitions in motorsport where gender parity is mandatory for pilots, alongside Extreme H, another championship linked to the group behind Formula E and E1.
“When I started racing, it was always with and against men. There were no female categories”, Cris Lazarraga, pilot at Team Rafa and former jet-ski racer, told Living Sports.
Actions like E1 are bringing real visibility and opportunities to women in the industry.
E1 also arrives within a sport marked by risk. Offshore powerboat racing claimed some of motorsport’s most recognisable names, including former Formula 1 driver Didier Pironi and Stefano Casiraghi, husband of Princess Caroline of Monaco. Yet E1’s RaceBirds were designed with those lessons in mind. Closed cockpits, foils that keep the hull airborne and controlled harbour circuits are all meant to reduce some of the open-ocean variables that made powerboat racing so unforgiving. Speed is also maxed out at 50 knots (roughly 93 kilometres per hour), whereas powerboats can go well beyond the 100-knot mark.
Since the series launched in 2024, there has not been a single rollover or fatal incident. Its most serious crash came in Monaco in 2025, when a rival boat’s bow struck Tom Chiappe’s cockpit during qualifying. The French pilot walked away completely unharmed. Still, racing is racing.
“When we’re racing, there’s nothing safe,” Lazarraga told us. “But we’ve pushed the RaceBirds to the limit, and it feels like they won’t roll over. So it feels safe.”
Celebrity owners and communications strategies may attract attention, but sport needs spectacle. Without it, there is no fan retention. E1’s CEO knows this: “The pilots are the ones bringing the excitement on the water, each with their own story. We wouldn’t be here without them.”
First, the format is deliberately compact. Each team fields one male and one female pilot, who compete in identical RaceBirds across tight harbour circuits. Races unfold over six laps, with mandatory short and long laps introducing a layer of strategy around overtaking, timing and clean water. Yet start lines and turns are where tension peaks, and when a pilots’ experience comes in.
From a wide array of motorsports competitions, E1’s pilot roster is unusually diverse: it hosts jet ski champions, offshore racers, karting drivers and GT pilots. As the sport is so new, they’ve all had to complete training at the Yacht Club de Monaco Academy before passing a superlicense issued by the UIM, the Union Internationale Motonautique, the sport’s governing body.
“At the beginning, I thought I could bring knowledge from jet ski racing, but the only thing in common with E1 is that we're on the water”, reflects with a grin, Cris Lazarraga.
The pilots are learning how to race the RaceBirds as the tournament advances. “Our boat is really tricky to drive. You're not just piloting a boat; you're literally flying” Tom Chiappe, pilot at Team Rafa, told us. That sensation comes from the foils: underwater wings that lift the hull clear of the surface at racing speed. The result is closer to controlled flight than traditional powerboating.
“Imagine flying an aeroplane in a tunnel, with a ceiling and a floor. That's what we're doing at all times”, explains Sam Coleman, the team Brady pilot who helped secure back-to-back E1 Series World Championships.
For pilots, the absence of a loud engine noise changes everything - they navigate by ear and feel, and their team’s data-led indications via radio. We asked Sam how that translates for spectators used to combustion engines.
“It's not silent. The propeller can sound like a combustion engine at times, and the foils whistle”, he said. “I’ve been a passionate petrolhead, so I understand sound is a big part of the theatre. But right now I’m tuned into technology and progress”.
For fans seeking roaring engines, E1 may not be the obvious answer. For those drawn to novel engineering, a pilot’s finesse and the amusement of seeing a boat fly, E1’s proposition is more than just entertaining.
Technology, design, speed and modern values are all factors to build a premium sport from scratch. Yet locations are essential.
The 2026 season of the E1 Series opened in Jeddah in January and continued at Lake Como in April. Dubrovnik follows on June 13th, and Monaco in July. Then the championship heads to a continent few global sports properties have explored: Africa. Luanda, Angola, hosts a race in September, followed by Lagos, Nigeria, in October. The season then closes in the Caribbean, with its final race weekend in the Bahamas in November.
This destination strategy sits at the heart of E1’s identity: bringing premium boat racing to exceptional waterfronts, paired with the highest standards of hospitality. Iconic settings such as Villa d’Este, the Excelsior overlooking the Adriatic and the Yacht Club de Monaco form part of an experience that brings E1 closer to Formula 1’s distinctive blend of sport and exclusivity.
While the sport is only three seasons old, it’s difficult not to feel that something genuinely modern and entertaining is taking shape. Whether it becomes the next Formula E is still an open question. Yet after stepping inside a RaceBird cockpit in Ibiza and talking to E1’s pilots and CEO, we can confidently say it’s worth tuning in and following closely.
The next E1 Series race is in Dubrovnik, Croatia, on June 13th. You can watch live on DAZN and YouTube.
