The Middle East’s first all-female supercar club – for luxury ladies with a Ferrari, Lamborghini or Bugatti in the garage
Based in Dubai in the UAE, the Arabian Gazelles club has 120 members driving high-spec cars from McLaren, Aston Martin, Rolls-Royce and Bentley – and plans to expand to Saudi Arabia
Exhibit A: Dubai’s Arabian Gazelles, a club exclusively for women with supercars.
The group was founded in 2016 by Algerian-born Hanan Mazouzi Sobati, an avid luxury car enthusiast and a self-made entrepreneur, who has called the emirates home for two decades.
When men first heard about our group, they were completely puzzled. They questioned our motives and the genuineness of our passion
Sobati says she was inspired to start the group because the male racing community considered women “zero and inefficient” at driving luxury sports cars at speed. For Sobati, this was too much to bear.
“It was a build-up of frustrations with the existing motoring landscape. On top of that, the lack of women representation in the world of supercars, the cluelessness of cars manufacturers and distributors when dealing with women, ultimately motivated me to start this club and break the glass ceiling,” she says.
The club’s name refers to a particular species of gazelle native to the region, known to be graceful and fast animals. “Arabian Gazelles clearly fits in with our philosophy as a car club, where women’s boldness speaks volumes,” Sobati says.
Right from the start, Sobati’s family has been supportive of her venture. “My parents and my husband … were the first to recognise my passion before anyone else and understood the need for me to follow and live it fully,” she says.
However, the road ahead wasn’t always an easy one.