Sports fans love to argue about which cities and countries enjoy the most vibrant sports cultures. Boston? Chicago? London? Melbourne? Italy? Brazil?
Recently, however, a new contender has emerged: Dubai. The emirate has poured millions into newly imported athletic pursuits like snowboarding and golf, and revived traditional contests like camel racing. And developers are now going even further, creating an entire mini-metropolis, an athletic mecca in the desert dedicated to sports. Residents of Dubai Sports City will live in villas nestled among four stadiums, four sports academies, a golf course, and a sports-themed shopping mall.
While the creators of this 50-million-square-foot planned community say it was "inspired by the greatest cities in the world," no other city has ever been designed specifically as "a place where sport is life, champions live, and legends are made." Legends usually take time to develop—but in Dubai, where it's perfectly reasonable to build a theme park the size of a major city, anything is possible.
The Dubai sports explosion is not the result of grass-roots growth but a promotional push not dissimilar to Wayne Gretzky's famous move to Los Angeles. International sports are fairly new in the emirate—the Dubai World Cup, the world's richest horse race, has only been around for 10 years—and they keep coming. Sports City's planners are also building a cricket stadium and a field hockey facility. Neither sport is currently popular in the UAE—but if you build it, the reasoning goes, the players will come.
Manchester United's brilliant Portuguese winger, Ronaldo, recently flew in to bestow his seal of approval on Man U's facility, located at the Al Wasl Sports Club. Dubai Sports City's golf course is designed by South African Ernie Els, the tennis school bears the name of Englishman David Lloyd, and Tiger Woods's old coach's imprimatur is all over the Butch Harmon School of Golf. There's even an outpost of Bradenton Academy, the Florida prep school where athletic prodigies prosper.
As the developers of Dubai Sports City like to say, "the future of sport and the future of living is nearer than you might think."
GOLF
The Dubai Desert Classic has become an annual stop on the PGA tour. With the help of generous appearance fees, the tournament draws the best golfers in the world. It is staged at the "desert miracle," a sprawling grass course at the Emirates Golf Club, replete with Bedouin tent architecture. As a matter of fact, these days Dubai is teeming with desert miracles—landscaped hills and grasslands designed by pros like Greg Norman, Vijay Singh, and the aforementioned Els.
RUGBY
To underscore the sport's foreign roots, Dubai's rugby team is called the Dubai Exiles. This doesn't mean the sport is shunned; exiles have been playing it for decades, and the Rugby Sevens tournament is one of the more established contests in town. Last year the three-day event drew nearly 70,000 people and featured not only professionals from Fiji and France but local teams, a women's division, and cheerleaders.
CAMEL RACING
Camel racing is a traditional sport that has seen a resurgence sparked by prize money and governmental incentives. Once informal events staged at festivals and weddings, races are now held at specialized tracks like the Nad Al Sheba on the outskirts of the city. Make no mistake: camel breeding is serious business. Special reproduction centers and embryo transfer clinics produce racing camels that can fetch almost $200,000.
DHOW RACING
One of Dubai's most elegant sports is dhow racing, featuring sleek wooden boats that local tradesmen have been using for centuries. In the 1980s, the UAE minister of finance and industry, Sheikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, initiated a dhow racing series; the season now lasts from September to May. At the start of a race, crews hoist the monumental lateen sails and the vessels whip through the bay. As they near the finish, watch them cruise past 300 artificial islands built to resemble a world map.
