Yulo enters floor, vault finals

Carlos Yulo secured spots in the vault and floor exercises finals but failed to do the same thing in the men’s individual all-around on Sunday in the 54th FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Championships at the Rotterdam Ahoy in the Netherlands.

Yulo, 26, scored 77.631 points to finish 34th in the qualifying round, missing the top 24 cutoff for the all-around final scheduled on Thursday.

The two-time Olympic gold medalist, however, kept his bid for another world title alive after qualifying for two apparatus finals.

Yulo finished second in the floor exercise qualifiers with 14.500 points and sixth in the vault with 14.266, setting up another opportunity to defend his vault title from last year’s world championships in Jakarta and reclaim the floor exercise crown he last won in 2019 in Stuttgart, Germany.

Paris Olympics gold medalist Oka Shinnosuke of Japan topped the all-around qualifiers with 85.098 points, followed by teammate and five-time world champion Hashimoto Daiki with 84.632.

Fresh from winning two gold medals at the 20th Asian Games in Nagoya, Japan, last September, Yulo will look to add to his world championship medal collection in the two apparatus finals.

Former junior world champion Arsenii Dukhno of Russia led the floor exercise qualifiers with 14.700 points, followed by 2023 world champion Artem Dolgopyat of Israel with 14.300.

Filipino-British gymnast Jake Jarman topped the vault qualifiers with 14.633, tying Artur Davtyan of Armenia, who finished second.

The apparatus finals will start on 24 October at the same venue.

Yulo’s younger brother, Karl Eldrew, also missed the all-around final after scoring 67.032 points for 137th place.

Miguel Besana finished 65th in the horizontal bar with 12.733 points.

Haylee Garcia, the Philippines’ lone female representative at the world championships, was competing as of press time.