No one will mistake this for Newport.

To reach the site picked for the next America’s Cup, swing past the camel racetrack near the airport.

Then pass by South Asian groceries and dusty rows of villas under construction. Finally, turn toward a stretch of the Persian Gulf where the ruling sheiks are building an island shaped a bit like a plant inspired by Dr. Seuss.

In a region where sports is routinely pushed to anything-is-possible heights — biggest, richest, most lavish — snagging the venerable America’s Cup is something apart even for the Emirates’ outsized visions.

The Cup, the oldest trophy in international sports, is scheduled to be decided in February off a little-known seaport, often called by its initials RAK, that is still a work in progress — and so close to Iran that the owner of the United States-based entry has talked openly about his security concerns.

But barring snags, the 158-year-old competition is off to RAK.

“We are ready, we are just waiting for the boats to arrive,” said Khater Massaad, an adviser to Ras al-Khaimah’s crown prince.

Two-time defending champion Alinghi of Switzerland — holding the winner’s right to pick the location — made the surprise selection of RAK early in August. It sets up a rare, head-to-head series against the American challenger, BMW Oracle Racing.

After the announcement, the Alinghi skipper Brad Butterworth — a four-time America’s Cup winner — said the steady and warm winter breeze off Ras al-Khaimah reminded him of the Caribbean. His rival, Russell Coutts, said he had to look it up on the map.

Here is an easy locator tip: find the gulf west of Saudi Arabia, head southeast and stop before the Strait of Hormuz.  Ras al Khaimah is on the southern shore. Iran’s coastline is fewer than 80 miles away.

This is partly what unnerves the owner of the BMW Oracle entry, the software mogul Larry Ellison. At an Aug. 11 presentation of his crew and trimaran in San Diego, Ellison ticked off his worries: proximity to Iranian territorial waters and the overall security for the event.

“So we’re all concerned about the safety of our crew and our shore crew and everyone getting set up there,” said Ellison, the founder and chief executive of Oracle Corp.

Whether that is enough for him to try to fight the Alinghi selection is not yet clear. Ellison, however, warned that BMW Oracle Racing is likely to go back to court over race rules, on-the-water umpires and the jury, citing possible unfair influence by the Alinghi owner, the Swiss biotech tycoon Ernesto Bertarelli.

Organizers of the RAK site answer the security questions with a question of their own: how many major terrorist attacks have struck the Emirates in the past decades? None.

It is true that the Emirates have not faced the kind of terrorism pressures of other countries in the region. Security remains noticeably light and discreet at hotels and other high-profile sites. Emirati forces also have gained vast experience in recent years guarding some of the world’s top sporting events and superstars like Tiger Woods, Roger Federer, and David Beckham.

Yet the oasis image can go only so far.

In December, officials in Bahrain said they arrested 14 people accused of plotting to attack commercial sites, the diplomatic district and night clubs in the capital, Manama. In Kuwait, authorities this month said they arrested six alleged Al Qaeda operatives who were planning to attack a United States military camp and other targets.

“No one is saying that this region is without risks, but there’s no internal threat in the U.A.E. as in other places,” said Mustafa Alani, the director of national security and terrorism studies at the Gulf Research Center in Dubai. “Plus, the U.A.E. is a highly controlled country.”

Visas are closely regulated by Emirati officials, and the Big Brother aura is strong. Almost any official transaction registers on a central database that includes telephone numbers, addresses and work visa sponsor.

“You are monitored from the time you arrive to the time you leave,” Alani said.

But with Iran just over the horizon, some still feel uneasy — or at least wondering whether staging the America’s Cup on Iran’s doorstep sends the right message as sports once against spills over into politics.

Congressman Brad Sherman, Democrat of California), who heads the House Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade, says that Ras al-Khaimah and other U.A.E. ports have been “utilized by smuggling networks to assist Iran’s weapons programs and its nuclear program.”

He urges that Washington demand stronger controls by U.A.E. authorities on exports to Iran as a condition for deeper ties, including a pact this year to offer American nuclear technology to the Emirates.

In Bahrain, a spokesman for the United States Navy's Fifth Fleet, Lt. Nate Christensen, said commanders were aware of the America’s Cup but had not received any request to “provide support.”

What the racers will likely see is certainly quite different from the waters off past America’s Cup sites: New York; Newport, R.I.; Fremantle, Australia; San Diego; Auckland, New Zealand; and Valencia, Spain.

A nonstop stream of supertankers and other vessels passes through the busy Strait of Hormuz. Two offshore oil fields rise from the turquoise water near Ras al-Khaimah — which means head of the tent in Arabic and comes, according to one local tale, from the golden tent top of an invading Persian warlord.

The 90-foot boats will glide into a natural lagoon and moor at a manmade island that is so new it does not yet have a name. The rest of the port has the off-balance feel of a place that is moving from sleepy obscurity to something more in line with its flashier cousins in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.