How We Built BuildRace: A Technical Deep Dive

Building BuildRace has been an incredible journey of technical challenges and creative solutions. In this post, we'll take you through the key decisions we made and the architecture that powers our platform. ## The Tech Stack We chose Next.js 14 as our foundation, paired with TypeScript for type safety. Firebase provides our real-time capabilities and authentication, while Stripe handles all payment processing seamlessly. ## Real-time Challenges One of our biggest challenges was ensuring fair competition timing across different time zones and network conditions. We implemented a sophisticated synchronization system that accounts for latency and ensures all participants have equal opportunity. ## AI Integration We've embraced AI tools as part of the development process, allowing participants to use ChatGPT, Claude, and other AI assistants during competitions. This reflects real-world development practices in 2025. ## What's Next We're constantly improving the platform based on user feedback. Coming soon: team competitions, more programming languages, and expanded prize pools.