MANILA – Filipino gymnast Carlos Edriel Yulo took home a gold, a silver and a bronze medal from the 55th All-Japan Seniors Championship on Thursday night in Tokyo Japan.
The 2020 Tokyo Olympics campaigner managed to defend his gold medal in the men’s floor exercise department while also repeating with a bronze medal in the vault apparatus.
Yulo, however, settled for a silver medal finish in the men’s team all-around event along with Japanese Kazuki Matsumi, Minori Haruki, Kazuya Takahashi, Takaaki Sugino, and Ishi Hiroto.
According to Yulo’s head coach Munehiro Kugiyama, the former world gymnast champion failed to participate in the other apparatuses because he suffered a finger injury.
“Caloy had an injury in his finger so he (did not complete in the) team and apparatus final events,” Kugiyama wrote on his Facebook page hours after the competition.
Last year in Yamagata, the 26-year-old Yulo captured a gold medal in the floor exercise after recording a score of 15.300 points before ending with a bronze in the vault with his 15.000 points.
Kugimiya also said Yulo’s showing in the All-Japan Seniors was a good build up for the 2022 World Artistic Gymnastics Championship slated from Oct. 29 to Nov. 6 in Liverpool, United Kingdom.
“We will now be preparing for the next world championships and a month later we will go to pre-camp in Paris for world championships and then directly go to world championships,” he added.
In the United Kingdom, the 4-foot-11 Yulo will be defending the vault championship he captured last year when the tournament was held in Kitakyushu, Japan. He also captured silver on the floor there.
“Lahat naman po ng competitions mahirap. Wala pong pinipili gaya ng SEA (Southeast Asian) Games or Asian Championship. Four days straight ‘yong competition. Pare-parehas po silang mahirap,” Yulo said./PN
