Carlos Yulo delivered another golden performance on Thursday afternoon at the Aichi-Nagoya 20th Asian Games to further cement his name as one of the best gymnasts ever in this generation.
‘It felt like Paris,’ said Yulo, who won the men’s floor exercise gold medal that will forever glitter as one of the most precious for the Philippines in the Asian Games.
Not only was the gold Yulo’s first on the continental stage, but it was also the country’s first in gymnastics in the 80-year history of the Asian Games.
‘I am truly overwhelmed and overjoyed by the experience,’ Yulo said. ‘It is a great honor to receive this blessing from God, and I will truly cherish it.’
Cherish he and the entire delegation will as the Philippines finally got into the gold medal column five days into the games where disappointments in swimming and mixed martial arts stunted the country’s campaign to match the four mints won in Hangzhou three years ago.
Drama and suspense marked Yulo’s journey on the floor exercise mat of the Rainbow Hall of the Nagoya City General Gymnasium. He was fourth to perform behind two South Koreans and his younger Eldrew and ahead of a Chinese and two Japanese and a Kazakh-all three are his podium nemesis for at least the past four years.
Eldrew Yulo didn’t get the scores good enough for a podium finish-he’s the youngest among the eight finalists at 18-but big brother was up next to bail the Philippine campaign that teetered on glass after MMA bets Jean Claude Saclag and Carlos Alvarez and swimmer Kayla Sanchez fell short of bagging gold medals.
Yulo pulled off a near flawless performance for a front-running 14.666 score on a 5.7 difficulty, but had to sit on the edge as he awaited his dreaded opponents to get their cts on the floor.
In the end, it was Kazakhstan’s Milad Karimi who got the silver with 14.600 points on the same difficulty as Yulo and Japan’s Shoma Tsukiyama claiming bronze with 14.566 points on a slightly less difficulty.
Yulo admitted he had to make crucial adjustments after his first pass although his landings were the steadiest among the finalists.
‘I knew after the first pass that I had to adjust, otherwise I won’t perform the way I did,’ said Yulo, who was awarded the gold by Philippine Olympic Committee president Abraham Tolentino during the medal ceremony.
Yulo has two more opportunities to win gold, in the vault and parallel bars that are set Friday.
‘Hopefully, this will spark a streak,’ Tolentino told the POC Media Pool with Yulo by his side. ‘One down, seven to go.’
Tolentino predicted at least eight gold medals in Nagoya to double the output in Hangzhou, although he lamented the lost opportunities in MMA and swimming.
‘Those should have been gold medals,’ said Tolentino referring to MMA’s Alvarez and Saclag, who settled for silver. ‘And Kayla was disheartened by her loss in the 100 meters [freestyle] and couldn’t get going in the 50.’
Sanchez again finished just outside the podium in the 100 free at 24.75 seconds-China’s Wu Qingfeng (23.98), Hong Kong-China’s Siobhan Haughey (24.32) and China’s Cheng Yujie (24.46) occupied the podium.
The men’s basketball 3×3 team of Nic Cabañero, Luis Pablo, Doy Dungo and Koji Buenaflor, meanwhile, advanced to the semifinals following a 21-19 victory over Chinese-Taipei, but will have their hands full reaching the gold medal match as they take on South Korea-22-13 winner over China-next.
The women’s 3×3 squad composed of Kennan Ka, Maria Pasilang, Amyah Espanol and Quinn de la Rosa-also reached the semifinals at Singapore’s expense, 22-12, but they’ll take on Thailand in Friday’s semifinals-the Thais beat the Iranians, 12-11.
In skateboarding, Mazel Paris and Jericho Francisco advanced to the final round of their respective events at the 20th Asian Games at Aichi Sky Expo also on Thursday.
Paris, 12, finished fourth in the women’s park preliminaries with 73.93 points, while Francisco had 80-64 points to also progress to the medal round.
Boxer Norlan Petecio exited from his Asian Games debut after losing to Japan’s Sewonrets Quincy Mensah Okazawa, 0-5, in a men’s 70 kgs round of 16 bout.