Taking place in Germany until 27th July, the event is led by Olympic runner-up Patrícia Mamona and boasts the largest ever contingent of Portuguese participants.
A total of 82 Portuguese student-athletes are participating in the World University Games, which began on Wednesday, 16th July, in Rhine-Ruhr, Germany.
Four students from NOVA University Lisbon are among them:
Filipe Almeida is an undergraduate student on the Administration programme at Nova SBE and an artistic gymnast.
Clara Judas Paiva, an Agroindustrial Technology student at NOVA FCT, will represent Portugal in rhythmic gymnastics.
Pedro Vasconcelos Araújo, a Management student at Nova SBE, is competing in tennis.
Rafaela Gomes Azevedo is also a Master’s student in Medicine at NOVA Medical School, in swimming.
“As the head of the mission, I want to apply some pressure, but as an athlete, I want to alleviate that same pressure, which is not good for athletes. The only thing I ask of them is to do their best,” said Patrícia Mamona, who was a NOVA student before going to the USA, emphasising that “expectations are quite high.”
Following their historic participation in Chengdu, China, in 2023, where Portugal won seven medals, the Portuguese delegation is seeking to repeat or surpass that achievement in Germany.
Composed of 125 members, including athletes, coaches, officials and medical staff, the Portuguese delegation will be distributed across six host cities: Bochum, Duisburg, Essen, Mülheim, Berlin and Hagen. Competitions are planned in 18 sports, with approximately 8,500 participants from over 150 countries.
Portugal will compete in individual events like athletics, artistic and rhythmic gymnastics, judo, swimming, taekwondo, tennis, table tennis, and archery. They will also participate in team events such as women’s basketball and men’s volleyball. In the group stage, the women’s basketball team will play against Chile, China, and Romania, while the men’s volleyball team will face Chinese Taipei, Brazil, and Australia.