The beaches of Rio de Janeiro, replete as they are with festive parties and the city’s scantily clad denizens, are a world apart from the religious theocracies of the Middle East. But a certain Brazilian cultural product has made deep inroads within a tiny kingdom tucked away along the Persian Gulf, and enjoys a status within the country’s social fabric more akin to a native custom than a foreign import.

Since its efficacy as a martial art was thrust upon the world during the first Ultimate Fighting Championship in 1993, Brazilian jiu-jitsu – a grappling system in which participants use technique and leverage to subvert strength and brute force by way of chokes and joint locks – has become the fastest growing martial art on the planet. Even so, one would probably be skeptical about the grappling art’s influence spreading as far as the United Arab Emirates.

In truth, jiu-jitsu has penetrated the depths of Emirati culture, but not on a merely organic level: it’s become an official government project, promoted by the seemingly endless resources of a shadowy ruling figure who has thrust the sport into the UAE’s educational curriculum and national consciousness.

Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed, a member of the ruling Al Nahyan family, was just as susceptible to the intrigue that Brazilian jiu-jitsu cultivated in hordes of nascent martial artists after UFC 1, and it just so happens that he’s since become the sport’s unofficial patron saint. In addition to establishing his Abu Dhabi Combat Club (ADCC) in 1998, a competition circuit that has come to embody the pinnacle of modern submission grappling, Sheikh Tahnoon has turned his own country into a vaunted hinterland for Brazilian jiu-jitsu athletes, many of whom immigrate to the UAE to train and teach.

“Abu Dhabi is one of the worldwide capitals of jiu-jitsu,” says Yasmin Sewgobind, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu teacher of Dutch and Indian descent, who now lives in Abu Dhabi. “Jiu-jitsu was my primary reason for moving to the UAE.”

Abdul Munam Al Hashimi, Chairman of the UAE Jiu Jitsu Federation, says “jiu-jitsu is a curriculum in more than 100 schools, there are more than 15 official jiu-jitsu centers that are under the supervision of the UAEJJF, and we are also currently working on building seven new jiu-jitsu centers across the UAE.”

According to Al Hashimi, it’s the only country where “billboards advertising jiu-jitsu,” can be seen along roadways and where certain tournaments are broadcast on national television.

Because of its state-funded orientation, Brazilian jiu-jitsu is already the UAE’s national sport, at least in the eyes of the UAEJJF, but it isn’t necessarily practiced equally between Emirati men and women. The UAE’s government functions under Sharia Law, and maintains deeply repressive rulings, a few of which are geared towards women.

So in a sense, practicing jiu-jitsu in Adu Dhabi as a woman presents more challenges than it does for a man. Elsewhere in the world, women train in the same classes as men, learn the same techniques and are judged by instructors on the same merit as their male counterparts.

According to Yasmin Sewgobind however, “it isn’t fully established yet to train BJJ as a woman” in the UAE. As Sewgobind is a decorated competitor, and the first female practitioner from the Netherlands to be awarded a black belt, she’s an ambassador of the sport who coaches in Abu Dhabi, but she says “there is no place for women to train if they are not a coach.”

She says the UAEJJF has flip-flopped its stance on mixed-gender training a number of times: “the rules aren’t very stable, and it’s still a struggle to have mixed-gender classes.”

Although Sewgobind does view many aspects of her life as a jiu-jitsu expatriate in a positive light, her experience might cast a somewhat skeptical air on Sheik Tahnoon’s ADCC organization, which brandishes the slogan “One World One Fight” rather proudly.

Since its origins, the ADCC has become a sprawling organization that promotes grappling tournaments throughout the world and within Abu Dhabi itself. Unmatched among the ADCC’s competitions is the ADCC world championships: a roaming tournament that takes place in different international locations every two years. Some competitors qualify for the tournament through regional ADCC sponsored events, whereas many are invited to compete. The tournament also pays winners thousands of dollars; something that’s typically unheard of among other jiu-jitsu tournaments.

The ADCC pits fighters from different grappling backgrounds against one another in a neutral framework of judging, so no style – whether it’s wrestling, judo, Brazilian jiu-jitsu or Russian sambo – is objectively favored. There’s no punching or kicking allowed and competitors compete in shorts and a shirt, however they can compete bare-chested if they so choose.

The ADCC comprises the starkest test of a grappler’s physical toughness. Clinching a title can be viewed on similar ground to winning Wimbledon or the Tour de France, at least in terms of the mental fortitude it takes to fight the world’s best.

This year’s ADCC world championships take place this weekend in Sao Paulo, Brazil, which for jet-setting Brazilian jiu-jitsu competitor AJ Agazarm, isn’t unfamiliar territory. But for Agazarm, a former Ohio State wrestler accustomed to the rush of dense crowds and whistling fans, the previous ADCC worlds in Beijing didn’t foster an atmosphere that matched its sense of prestige.

When thinking about ADCC 2013, Agazarm recalls an eerily quiet venue and large stands that loomed unpopulated: “In Beijing, to see 100 in the stands, it was crazy. We couldn’t wrap our heads around it. It didn’t really make sense ... because we’re used to competing for big crowds, we’re used to performing in front of lots of people for such a big event,” he says.

Agazarm’s characterization of the ADCC world championships as a “big event” is true, even if the tournament two years ago didn’t exactly ignite fireworks across Beijing. Quite simply, there is nothing else like the ADCC in modern martial arts, but then again, there isn’t really anything that quite mirrors the rise of jiu-jitsu in Abu Dhabi, and Sheikh Tahnoon’s strategic push to internationalize the sport through sponsorship visas.

Al Hashimi says that “there are over six hundred Brazilian coaches that run the majority of the schools and jiu-jitsu clubs in the UAE.”

In that sense, the ADCC has succeeded in its mission of promoting jiu-jitsu across the globe. It has helped the sport dramatically expand its reach, as it boasts “federations”, or satellite offices, throughout Europe and much of Asia. Some people think it could provide the blueprint for pushing Brazilian jiu-jitsu into the Olympics one day.

Kid Peligro, a writer who’s spent over 20 years immersed in the BJJ world, says of Sheik Tahnoon: “That was his master to plan, to get the sport so big that it would be in the Olympics.” Peligro notes that without the Sheik’s “resources and energy,” Brazilian jiu-jitsu would still be anonymous in the Emirates, just like it was in the United States at one time.

Peligro recalls when the sport was a fringe activity, and that when he was first learning jiu-jitsu in a garage twenty-years ago, that “it was just so special and so unknown.”

The fact that it’s quite the opposite now, and that athletes like Agazarm and Sewgobind compete in BJJ competitions held around the world, indicates that the sport’s popularity isn’t going anywhere. Oddly enough, it just might take the immaculate wealth and unrelenting passion of a certain Sheikh from Abu Dhabi to make Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu something that crops up on television and works its way into the Olympic Games. For now however, we have this weekend’s ADCC world championships as a substitute.