From ISEF-Porto to FADEUP: three key references in the consolidation of the Theory and Methodology of Sport Training curricular unit at the University of Porto

Abstract

In Portugal, Sport Training became scientifically consolidated through academic hubs strongly connected to practice, in which ISEF-Porto and, later, FCDEF-UP and FADEUP played a central role in linking the university with the sporting field. At INEF-Lisboa, from the 1940s onwards, the first steps were taken toward the academic formalisation of Sport Training, initially centred on teacher education and progressively incorporating specific training-related contents. This movement influenced the context in Porto, where the institutional evolution from ISEF-Porto to FCDEF-UP and FADEUP supported a culture of knowledge production, pedagogical innovation and transfer to practice. This essay-style article seeks both to pay tribute to and to analyse the role of three key figures in this lineage — Vítor Frade, António Marques and José Oliveira — who, over several decades, were responsible for the core curricular unit Theory and Methodology of Sport Training within the undergraduate degree and for its consolidation as a structuring axis of the curriculum. The article identifies historical and institutional contexts that were fundamental to the academic education of coaches, discusses the continuity and current pedagogical relevance of this legacy, and proposes an agenda for the next decade centred on ecological validation, data-driven science and close relationships with key actors in the sporting community.