Although the first ASCE National Concrete Canoe Competition was held in 1988, the history of Concrete Canoe in the United States actually began in the 1960s, when a small number of ASCE Student Chapters began holding intramural concrete canoe races. 

Then, in the 1970s, both the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the University of California, Berkeley claim to have held the first regional competition.  In the more than 30 years since, the students’ efforts to combine engineering excellence and hydrodynamic design to construct water-worthy canoes have culminated in an advanced form of concrete construction and racing technique known as the “America’s Cup of Civil Engineering.”