The San Francisco Boat Race (by Entrepreneurs First)
Entrepreneurs First Presents: The San Francisco Boat Race
Calling all builders.
Entrepreneurs First is hosting the inaugural San Francisco Boat Race, an intensive engineering competition where teams will design, build, and race handmade boats in a literal trial by water. (We’ll also be watching the FIFA World Cup Final together from the office while everyone builds.)
🏆 Winning Prize: A Bambu Lab P2S 3D Printer, dinner with EF investors, and an exclusive meeting with Chris Mairs, prolific angel investor, early backer of Entrepreneurs First, and Board Member at Raspberry Pi.
The Challenge
Teams of 3-4 will have 3 hours to engineer a functional boat using only a limited set of provided materials:
Cardboard
Duct tape
Foam
The build session will take place at the Entrepreneurs First San Francisco office before teams travel together to a private pool in San Mateo for the Boat Race.
There, boats will be tested for buoyancy, structural integrity, and speed. If it sinks… better luck next year.
Schedule
10:30 AM: Check-in and welcome at the Entrepreneurs First SF office
11:00 AM: Team formation and challenge briefing
11:30 AM: Boat design and build session
2:30 PM: Travel to the pool in San Mateo
3:30 PM: Boat Race and pool testing
5:00 PM: Awards ceremony and closing
Schedule is approximate and may be adjusted slightly based on venue logistics.
Why You Should Be Here
Build Something Real
Spend an afternoon designing, prototyping, and shipping under real engineering constraints alongside some of the Bay Area’s strongest technical builders.
Meet exceptional builders from all over the SF Bay Area, and build a boat!
Win Cool Prizes
🏆 A Bambu Lab P2S 3D Printer
💻 Meeting with Chris Mairs, one of Silicon Valley’s most respected angel investors, a Board Member at Raspberry Pi, and an early backer of Entrepreneurs First
🍽️ Dinner with EF investors
Entrepreneurs First (EF) invests in exceptional individuals before they have a company. Some founders arrive with an idea. Others arrive looking for the right cofounder. What matters most is their ambition and potential. EF provides funding, mentorship, and access to one of the world’s strongest founder networks to help them build globally significant technology companies. To date, EF's portfolio is worth >$18B+