CARLOS YULO targets a men’s all-around berth in the world championships as he vies in the Asian Artistic Gymnastics Championships starting Thursday at the OCBC Arena in Singapore.
Yulo already qualified in floor exercise, vault and parallel bars with the all-around missing on his list for the world championships Belgium is hosting in Antwerp from September 30 to October 8.
“He [Yulo] knows what’s at stake in this tournament—it’s the world championships slot heading to the Paris Olympics,” Gymnastics Association of the Philippines president Cynthia Carrion-Norton told BusinessMirror Tuesday. “That’s why I’m very satisfied seeing him jumping during practice earlier. I feel his energy.”
Yulo earned his qualification for Antwerp from his medal-clinching performances in the country-hopping International Gymnastics Federation apparatus series early this year.
But Yulo, who flew to Singapore from Tokyo over the weekend, will have his hands full in the Asian championships which drew gymnasts from 45 countries, including China, Japan and Vietnam.
Hanoi Southeast Asian Games double gold medal winner Aleah Finnegan, Lucia Gutierrez, Kylee Anne Kvamme, Emma Lauren Malabuyo and Ancilla Lucia Mari Manzano are also competing in Singapore in women’s artistic starting on Wednesday.
SEA Games vault gold medalist Juancho Miguel Besana and floor exercise winner John Ivan Cruz, Justin Ace de Leon and Jann Gwynn Timbang open their campaign in the men’s contest also on Thursday.