REIGNING world vault champion Carlos Edriel Yulo was pulled down by his mediocre performances in the pommel horse, rings, and parallel bars yesterday to wind up 11th in the men’s all-around event of the Emperor’s Cup 76th Individual General Gymnastics championships at the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium in Japan.
Yulo garnered 167.764 points from the six apparatuses — floor exercise, rings, vault, pommel horse, parallel bars, horizontal bar — to finish 7.397 points behind Tokyo Olympic double gold medalist Dashiki Hashimoto, who ruled the event with 174.161 points.
Weighing the Tokyo Olympics veteran down was his 31st place finish in the pommel horse, scoring 12.733 points, and had scores of 14.233 and 14.000 points in placing 15th and 12th, respectively, in the parallel bars and rings.
Yulo was in his element in his pet vault event with the best score of 15.033 points and second in the floor exercise, where he won the gold in the 2019 world gymnastics championships in Stuttgart, Germany, with 14.700 points.
The pint-sized Pinoy gymnast shared 16th place in the horizonal bar with hometown bet Shiga Tachiban with identical 13.633 points each.
Gymnastics chief Cynthia Carrion said the rings and pommel horse apparatus were Yulo’s weakest events “which is what he and Japanese coach Munehiro Kugimiya are working to improve on before the 31st Vietnam Southeast Asian Games next month.”
Carrion, however, remained that You would dominate the regional meet anew similar to when he bagged two gold and five silver medals in the Philippine edition three years ago in emerging as the country’s most medalled athlete of the Games.
