Carlos Yulo Brings Home The Gold, Ready To Compete In The World Championships

Yulo takes home a total of five medals, including three gold medals, qualifying him to compete for the world championships in September.

Carlos Yulo’s achievements in gymnastics prove that Filipinos have what it takes to compete worldwide as its popularity grows in the country. Following a stellar run at the 32nd Southeast Asian (SEA) Games last month, where he took home two gold medals and two silver medals, the former two-time world gymnastics champion now takes home three gold medals at the recently concluded Asian Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Singapore. This is the second time the 23-year-old Tokyo Olympian finished as the Asian Artistic Gymnastics Championship’s most-awarded male gymnast.

Yulo received a total of five medals at the event, including a gold medal each for the floor, parallel bars, and vault events, a silver in the individual all-around, and a bronze in the high bars. His placement in the all-around qualifies him to compete in the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships set to happen at Antwerp, Belgium, in September of this year, bringing him one step closer to the Paris 2024 Olympics.

Joining him at the World Championships are Filipino-American gymnasts Aleah Finnegan, who finished the event with two bronze medals for women’s vault and balance beam, and Emma Lauren Malabuyo, who took home a silver medal for the women’s floor event. Until recently, gymnastics was considered an ‘elite’ sport, but with the availability of scholarships and grants, as well as the support of other countries like Japan, gymnastics has become more accessible to a greater number of Filipinos.

Yulo’s Olympic journey started after an impressive run at the Doha World Cup in 2018, after which the Japanese Olympic Committee offered him a scholarship. Yulo has since competed in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, with a fourth-place finish at the vault event as his best finish. In an earlier interview, the gymnast said he had learned from his mistakes at his first Olympics foray, stating that “I realized that your greatest opponent is yourself. If you don’t focus on what you do, you are bound to finish last.”