# Why the “Math Mafia” is doing well
**作者**: Jesse Zhang
**日期**: 2026-07-13T19:25:05.000Z
**来源**: [https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715)
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A few months ago, our Hudson River Trading intern class went viral because the group included Jeff Yan (founder of Hyperliquid), Scott Wu (cofounder of Cognition), Alexandr Wang (founder of Scale), and me with @DecagonAI. It sparked a broader conversation about how my generation, who did math, coding, and science olympiads growing up, represents a disproportionate amount of today’s founders.
There’s more of us: Johnny Ho (cofounder of Perplexity), Steven Hao and Walden Yan (other cofounders of Cognition), Demi Guo (cofounder of Pika), Albert Gu (cofounder of Cartesia), the list goes on.
This post is my reflection on why this is and how it has affected our hiring at Decagon (and my plans for any future kids :)).
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What is an olympiad? If you’re not super familiar, they’re basically academic competitions that are difficult and timed. For example, for math, it’s typically 6 hard problems over two days, 4.5 hours per day. Here are examples of simple (but not easy) questions:
“Determine all triples of positive integers (a, b, c) such that each of the numbers ab − c, bc − a, ca − b is a power of 2.”
“Suppose a, b, c are the side lengths of a triangle. Prove that a²b(a−b) + b²c(b−c) + c²a(c−a) ≥ 0, and determine when equality occurs.“
Everyone is ranked nationally and then eventually internationally. The top students get brought to a summer camp, which is where you first get to know each other.
Besides the obvious fact that math and coding talent translates well to tech, the problem-solving traits that olympiads help develop carry over to building a company. Many challenges founders face are difficult and ambiguous. This isn’t limited to technical challenges – how to build an org, how to design a GTM strategy …it’s all applicable. Being able to slowly chew through them systematically and rationally is a big advantage.
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The bigger factor actually is that the competitions develop kids in very high-pressure, competitive environments. Regardless of how talented you are, doing well requires extreme grinding and sacrifice over many years. Doing well really makes you believe you can do hard things. This breeds people who normalize hard work and don’t shy away from intense competition.
A lot of my work ethic can be credited to people in this community who I watched develop their craft relentlessly day after day without any breaks. Some of them knew every olympiad problem by heart from the last 30 years. It’s hard not to be inspired by that.
This is also why we’ve made it a point to hire many folks with contest backgrounds at Decagon. They don’t embrace hard work because they have to… it’s just a waste of their talent and potential otherwise 🙂.
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The final piece is that having a community of friends doing the same thing is very powerful. Historically, many of the earlier generations would build careers in academia or quant finance. When I was in high school, I saw the first couple of folks start companies. Many of them did not end up working out, but it was very cool to see them building something from scratch. Being able to learn from peers doing the same thing as you lets you draw inspiration from successes and avoid mistakes.
As everyone got older and went to college, quant finance firms were popular internships (Hudson River Trading, Citadel, Jane Street, D.E. Shaw). They’re basically a real-world form of math contests where work ethic and problem-solving are directly rewarded. Citadel kicked off their internship with a literal live math contest for all the interns.
The group in the photo was the first-ever HRT intern class, during my freshman year. Shortly after that, Alexandr dropped out to start Scale, which of course was an inspiring journey, and even more so to see up close.
Like how the “Paypal Mafia” produced such a dense group of people starting companies, investment firms, and funds, I suspect we’ll see more and more people from the Olympiad community in the coming years. I’m very excited to see what everyone does as we get older.
I’d extend this to the science research contests too. Research Science Institute (a high school research camp and one of my favorite summers growing up) has an alumni group that includes Michael Truell (Cursor) and Karim Atiyeh (Ramp). We have four other alumni at Decagon.
For this reason alone, I’d heavily encourage olympiads or academic contests for all kids, depending on what you’re interested in. The community will live with you for your whole life.
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Of course, I should say that founding a company requires many more skills than what you learn in olympiads. For example, olympiads are generally individual contests, while startups are very much a team sport. I’m constantly humbled by the endless sea of skills to learn. Contests are great for solving problems you receive but often in life, you need to come up with your own problems.
## 相关链接
- [Jesse Zhang](https://x.com/thejessezhang)
- [@thejessezhang](https://x.com/thejessezhang)
- [683K](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715/analytics)
- [@DecagonAI](https://x.com/@DecagonAI)
- [Upgrade to Premium](https://x.com/i/premium_sign_up)
- [3:25 AM · Jul 14, 2026](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715)
- [683.5K Views](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715/analytics)
- [View quotes](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715/quotes)
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*导出时间: 2026/7/18 15:16:58*
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## 中文翻译
# 为什么“数学黑手党”混得风生水起
**作者**: Jesse Zhang
**日期**: 2026-07-13T19:25:05.000Z
**来源**: [https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715)
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几个月前，我们 Hudson River Trading 的实习生群体在网上火了，因为这个团队包括 Jeff Yan（Hyperliquid 创始人）、Scott Wu（Cognition 联合创始人）、Alexandr Wang（Scale 创始人）以及我和 @DecagonAI。这引发了更广泛的讨论：为什么我们这一代——那些从小参加数学、编程和科学奥林匹克竞赛的人——在今天的创业者中占据了不成比例的比例？
还有更多人：Johnny Ho（Perplexity 联合创始人）、Steven Hao 和 Walden Yan（Cognition 的其他联合创始人）、Demi Guo（Pika 联合创始人）、Albert Gu（Cartesia 联合创始人），名单还在继续。
这篇文章是我对这一现象的思考，以及它如何影响了我们在 Decagon 的招聘（以及我对未来孩子的计划：））。
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什么是奥林匹克竞赛？如果你不太熟悉，它们基本上是高难度且计时的学术竞赛。例如，数学通常是在两天内完成 6 道难题，每天 4.5 小时。以下是一些简单（但并不容易）的题目示例：
“求出所有满足以下条件的正整数三元组 (a, b, c)：ab − c, bc − a, ca − b 都是 2 的幂。”
“假设 a, b, c 是三角形的边长。证明 a²b(a−b) + b²c(b−c) + c²a(c−a) ≥ 0，并确定等号何时成立。”
每个人都会在全国范围内排名，最终进行国际排名。顶尖学生会被选入夏令营，那里也是你们初次相识的地方。
除了数学和编程天赋能很好地转化为技术能力这一显而易见的事实外，奥林匹克竞赛有助于培养的解决问题的特质也能延续到建立公司的过程中。创业者面临的许多挑战既困难又模糊。这不仅限于技术挑战——如何构建组织架构、如何设计 GTM（推向市场）策略……这一切都是适用的。能够有条不紊、理性地慢慢攻克这些问题，是一个巨大的优势。
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实际上，更大的因素在于，这些竞赛让孩子们在高压和竞争激烈的环境中成长。无论你的天赋如何，想要取得好成绩都需要多年的极度努力和牺牲。做得好真的让你相信自己能做难事。这培养出了那些将努力工作常态化且不回避激烈竞争的人。
我的很多职业道德都要归功于这个社区的人，我看着他们日复一日、不知疲倦地磨练自己的技艺，从不间断。有些人能背出过去 30 年里的每一道奥林匹克竞赛题。很难不被这种精神所鼓舞。
这也是为什么我们特意在 Decagon 招聘了许多有竞赛背景的人。他们拥抱努力工作并不是因为他们不得不做……否则，那只是对他们天赋和潜力的浪费：）。
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最后一点是，拥有一群做同样事情的朋友群体是非常强大的。从历史上看，许多早期一代的人会在学术界或量化金融领域发展职业生涯。我在高中的时候，看到最早的一批人开始创办公司。其中许多公司最终并没有成功，但看到他们从零开始构建某种东西，仍然非常酷。能够从从事同样事情的同龄人那里学习，你可以从成功中获得启发，并避免错误。
随着大家长大并进入大学，量化金融公司成为了受欢迎的实习选择（Hudson River Trading, Citadel, Jane Street, D.E. Shaw）。它们基本上是数学竞赛的现实世界版本，职业道德和解决问题的能力在那里会得到直接的回报。Citadel 甚至以一场真正的现场数学竞赛开启了所有实习生的实习生活。
照片中的这群人是第一届 HRT 实习生班级，当时是我大一那年。在那之后不久，Alexandr 退学创办了 Scale，这当然是一段鼓舞人心的旅程，而且近距离观看更是如此。
就像“Paypal 黑手党”孕育了如此密集的一群创业、投资和基金领域的人一样，我怀疑在未来几年我们会看到越来越多来自奥林匹克社区的人。随着我们年龄的增长，我非常兴奋地看到大家会做出什么成就。
我会将这一点扩展到科学研究竞赛。科学研究学院（Research Science Institute，一个高中研究夏令营，也是我成长过程中最喜欢的夏天之一）的校友群体包括 Michael Truell（Cursor）和 Karim Atiyeh（Ramp）。我们在 Decagon 还有另外四位校友。
仅仅因为这个原因，我也会强烈鼓励所有孩子参加奥林匹克竞赛或学术竞赛，这取决于你的兴趣所在。这个社区将伴随你一生。
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当然，我应该说，创办公司需要的技能远比你在奥林匹克竞赛中学到的要多。例如，奥林匹克竞赛通常是个人竞赛，而初创公司非常讲求团队合作。我常常感到谦卑，因为需要学习的技能浩如烟海。竞赛很擅长解决你接到的问题，但在生活中，你往往需要提出你自己的问题。
## 相关链接
- [Jesse Zhang](https://x.com/thejessezhang)
- [@thejessezhang](https://x.com/thejessezhang)
- [683K](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715/analytics)
- [@DecagonAI](https://x.com/@DecagonAI)
- [升级到 Premium](https://x.com/i/premium_sign_up)
- [3:25 AM · Jul 14, 2026](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715)
- [683.5K 次查看](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715/analytics)
- [查看引用](https://x.com/thejessezhang/status/2076749775043690715/quotes)
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*导出时间: 2026/7/18 15:16:58*