Editor’s note: The following (lightly edited) feature article is the tenth installment of our “How I Became Obsessed With Padel” series from regular guest contributor Scott Matulis, a leading West Coast padel writer whose work you can find in numerous racquet-sports publications, including his own padel Substack.
I’ve seen Khadeejah Sani over and over again since I started writing about padel.
I think she’s won just about every tournament I’ve ever attended. She’s an important figure in the Los Angeles padel scene. An extraordinary athlete who has competed internationally in soccer and endurance horse riding, she’s also represented Team USA in several international padel competitions including the Pan-American Senior Championships and the Pan-American Cat Libres (Open Categories) Championships — where Team USA brought home a bronze medal just last month.
In 2024, she founded Chiquitas California, the first and only women’s padel community in Los Angeles, patterning it after a similar community she initially launched in Dubai.
Through Chiquitas California, she runs both social and official padel events throughout Southern California including a series of USA Padel 100s in 2025, featuring the United States’ first-ever Breast Cancer Awareness sanctioned tournament, USA Padel 100 Pink Padel Cup, the USA Padel 250 Chiquitas Spring Padel Cup, and most recently the only FIFA World Cup-themed USA Padel 500 — making history with close to 100 male and female players competing across the most divisions for a sanctioned tournament in Los Angeles, held at Pura Padel back in July.
Which is why I wanted to learn exactly what led her to become so obsessed with padel. Here’s what I found out…
So, your origin story includes Michigan, the Middle East, princes, giraffes, and eventually padel?
Yes, it’s a crazy story. I was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan and moved to Dubai when I was 13 with my family. I’m the eldest of five.
My parents were always looking at better, safer environments to raise us. We lived in inner city Detroit, only two miles from 8-mile. I’m sure people were like, ‘Why don’t you just move to a suburb somewhere in Michigan?’ But my parents wanted us to grow up in a society that was more Islam-oriented, so a nation that was also a Muslim country was always the goal.
I remember: I’m 13 and we’re gathered around our dining table in Detroit during the summer of 2001. My mom pulls up a map and asked, ‘How do you feel about moving to this area of the world?’ while pointing to the Middle East. We actually had three opportunities to choose from: Dubai, Abu Dhabi (the capital of the UAE) or Riyadh (the capital of Saudi Arabia).
Your family just picked up and moved to the Middle East, no job, sight unseen?
My mom got the most amazing job offer which covered the cost of almost everything, including a large villa and our school tuition, plus an attractive salary.
She has a PhD in psychology from the University of Detroit Mercy just blocks away from 6-mile where I grew up and she had worked for years with underprivileged children in the Detroit Public Schools system.
The offer was to teach psychology to first-generation local college students in Dubai or Abu Dhabi at the only women’s public university in the country called Zayed University, which still successfully operates to this day.
And in 2001 when we first relocated from Detroit, Dubai was not at all as hyped as it is now. But really, it was just by chance that we chose it, you know? We really didn’t have any reasoning behind it, going with Dubai over Abu Dhabi or even Riyadh.
But the time I was in Dubai, especially early 2000s Dubai, definitely shaped the way I am. I’m so grateful for that experience.
When you say that, how did it shape who you are? Are you able to walk long distances without water?
I mean, we can start with the reason why we’re even talking right now: padel.
I was introduced to padel in Dubai. That was years after I had graduated from high school in Dubai and went back to Detroit to attend college at the University of Michigan, but my family has been based in Dubai since 2001 when we first moved there. It’s been 25 years now. I do a lot of back and forth because our base is Dubai. And it’s shaped me in terms of opportunities, and generally in regards to religion and adopting the Middle Eastern culture & customs.
In Dubai, the mentality of the leaders is that opportunities are limitless and you’re able to really chase after your dreams, kind of like the Gold Rush in California. When we moved to Dubai, it was before the buzz that is currently trending. Now you’ve got a whole bunch of influencers and celebrities, everyone moving there because of what they see on the Internet and you have these reality TV shows that are making Dubai appear one way, but we were there before that.
I watched the tallest building in the world get built from the entrance to my high school. We had a clear view of Burj Khalifa across the desert. And also the first indoor ski resort in the Middle East. The Mall of the Emirates has this indoor ski slope, and I watched them building it every day.
When did you start hobnobbing with royalty?
I happened to go to school with members of the Royal Family and became close friends with a number of the Princesses of Dubai. I got to visit their palaces and meet their fathers and their uncles, people with high positions in the Dubai government who were the decision-makers in shaping the city. So it was really a first-hand, inside look at what their vision was to put Dubai on the global front and how unapologetically passionate they were in doing that.
That zealous drive honestly has shaped the way I am. Being that I’m from Detroit, I already have that hustle mentality, but my time in Dubai instilled the idea of never being afraid to chase after your dreams; being passionate about something and then just going full force with it.
Alright — so how did you end up in the school with the royal family? Like, who are you?
I’m telling you, it was chance. Just like us choosing to go to Dubai to begin with.
We ended up going to a private American curriculum school. So our classmates are 95% Emirati, which is the term for locals from the UAE. And that’s how we had classmates that were from the Royal Family of Dubai.
I am playing padel right now because of the opportunities given to me by one person in Dubai. And he is the current Crown Prince of Dubai. No lie. Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. Google him!
From what I’ve heard about you, there was a lot of back and forth between Dubai and the United States?
So, my parents always intended for us to go back to the U.S. for college and after graduating with a Bachelors Degree in Industrial & Operations Engineering from the University of Michigan, I went on to Cornell University and graduated with my Master’s Degree in Biological & Environmental Engineering. Without a gap year, I moved to California in 2012 to directly continue a third degree in Engineering.
During my first winter break, which of course I spent in Dubai visiting my family who remained based there, my two future worlds would collide: endurance horse racing and padel.
My middle sister, Hafsah, is a big animal person. So she got involved, again by chance, with the Royal Family’s stables and began learning how to ride on the horses owned by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the Ruler of Dubai.
They’re big on racing horses and racing camels and even Saluki dogs, any desert animal there is. Even falcons have timed competitions. The traditional Arabian Gulf desert animals. They like to race them and they own hundreds and thousands of them.
I don’t know if you saw the movie Hidalgo, but it’s based on long-distance Arabian desert racing which would give you an idea of the sport. Endurance horse racing is the marathon racing of equestrianism and the Dubai Royal Family is very passionate about. My sister Hafsah trained for that, and eventually started preparing to compete for the Ruler of Dubai’s stable.
I went back to California two weeks later, determined to begin learning how to horse ride as well during my engineering graduate program so I could join my sister and compete alongside her whenever I was back in Dubai.
I never thought Viggo Mortensen would be part of this interview. So, how do we go from horse racing to padel?
The Prince of Dubai, Sheikh Hamdan, has a maternal uncle that he’s really close to, Sheikh Saeed bin Maktoum bin Juma Al Maktoum, who was into tennis. He actually represented the UAE in tennis. Together, they introduced padel to the UAE with Sheikh Saeed serving as the President of the UAE Padel Association.
Sheikh Hamdan is like The Man in Dubai. He’s the No. 1 influencer. Whatever he does, everyone wants to do. So he’s a real trendsetter and when he started to play padel along with his uncle, Sheikh Saeed, and friends, it caught on to a lot of people in the city.
He has his own private four-court indoor padel facility, right on the same property where we would go every day to train his horses. It’s called the NAS Sports Complex.
So, one day in October 2015 when I was visiting Dubai from my engineering graduate program in California, I just decided randomly, instead of going in and out of the stables section of Sheikh Hamdan’s estate after my sister and I had finished training on his horses, to venture on through his private property, something I was definitely not supposed to do.
The Prince’s estate is in the center of Dubai. Totally off the radar. Private property. It’s guarded by armed secret security, many who I actually became acquainted with over the years of riding for Sheikh Hamdan. He has an elephant section, a giraffe section, an ostriches section like literally his own private safari in the middle of the desert. I’m not joking. Our endurance horse training sessions would involve riding past these different sections.
I ventured from the horse riding section through camels, giraffes, elephants, all these animals are in the center of Dubai. And I stumbled upon Sheikh Hamdan’s padel section.
So, I go into his massive sports facility and that day happened to be the first time the World Padel Tour (WPT, the professional padel circuit before the current Premier Padel) ever had an event outside of the main padel cities in Europe (like Madrid or Barcelona) and in South America (like Buenos Aires).
That very day I caught the semi-finals of the historic WPT Dubai Masters 2015. I go into this facility that I never knew existed, watching a sport that I never knew existed. And I see the best players in the world playing padel for the first time in my life. I was completely blown away!
I look at them and I have absolutely zero experience in racquet sports, but I was just like, ‘Whatever this is that they’re doing, I wanna do it.’ And that was how I became obsessed with padel since day one in Dubai!
So, I signed up for Sheikh Hamdan’s private membership to learn how to play padel at his NAS Sports Complex, on the very same courts that I witnessed the WPT Dubai Masters, which I was only able to receive because I was already in the ‘Circle of the Prince’ since I raced his horses. Because he provided membership for free. It was just literally like for his friends and affiliates and anyone who had something to do with him, absolutely nobody else could get into the NAS Sports Complex.
You could play padel or go to the gym for as many hours as you wanted. You could get free lessons, and you could invite your friends and family as well. So, for summers, I would go in and hit with my sister when it was the off-season for endurance horse racing. Many times, celebrities and athletes would receive invites from Sheikh Hamdan to play padel at NAS and even ride some of his horses and camels. He is the most friendly and generous Prince there is.
So you became pals with the prince and embraced by the royal family?
Well, Sheikh Hamdan would see us in his facility playing padel during the off-season of endurance and support us during the season when we raced his horses. He would look at us and he would just smile and nod while watching us play padel because we were active in the sports he loved.
They knew us as the American sisters since we were the only females playing padel at the NAS Sports Complex and definitely the only non-Emirati players. Sheikh Hamdan would do these surprise visits. All the guys that were on the UAE National Padel Team would call their buddies up and be like, ‘He’s coming, get here ASAP!’
But Sheikh Hamdan would see us in our natural element enjoying padel, because he knew we didn’t get those memos about his arrival, and he was surprised numerous times to see us genuinely playing a sport that he loved and passionately promoted, so those were very special moments for my sister and I with Sheikh Hamdan to have both endurance horse racing interactions with him at his stables and also padel interactions with him while at his NAS Sports Complex.
We would witness people go up to him and ask him for stuff, a new car or a house. And no lie, he would give it to them. My sister and I witnessed it so we’re like, we are never going to be that. We are going to earn his attention by being ourselves and training to do our best racing his horses and competing in padel.
So, if you texted him right now, how long would it be before he replied, the Prince I mean?
Instantly, just kidding! I do not text the Prince of Dubai, but I know how to reach him directly through his entourage who I’m in touch with and I also know the places in Dubai where I can find him, so I’ve truly been blessed to know him and I fully owe my obsession with padel to him!
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