# 3 possible reasons why Polkadot is playing second fiddle in the L1 race
“# 3 possible reasons why Polkadot is playing second fiddle in the L1 race ” 2021 was a sort of “coming-of-age” for many layer-one (L1) blockchain protocols because the growth of decentralized finance (DeFi) and nonfungible tokens (NFTs) forced users to look for solutions outside of the Ethereum (ETH) network where high fees and network…