Paris Olympics: Carlos Yulo finishes 12th in all-around finals

Carlos Yulo settled for 12th place in the all-around finals. USA Today Sports (file photo)
By Ivan Saldajeno

MANILA--Carlos Yulo failed to score a medal in the first of three tries to make the Paris Olympics podium during the men's all-around artistic gymnastics finals early Thursday (Philippine Time) at the Accor Arena.

A fall during his turn in the pommel horse virtually sealed Yulo's fate as he missed out on stealing a podium spot from either Shinnosuke Oka, Zhang Boheng, or Xiao Ruoteng.

Yulo had to first take the pommel horse, which is well-known to be his main struggle, and the fall late into his routine led him to the lowest output for the said apparatus at 11.9 points.

He bounced back in the next five rotations, including decent runs in the vault and floor exercise in what could be preludes to his game plans come the finals for the said apparatuses over the weekend.

Yulo was tied for third in the vault with 14.766 points and was tied for fourth in the floor with 14.333.

Yulo totaled 83.032 points, just a tad lower than the 83.631 he got during the preliminary round.

Japan's Oka escaped with the gold after amassing 86.832 points, while the Chinese duo of Zhang (86.599) and Xiao (86.634) settled for a 2-3 finish.

There was an anxious moment, however, at the end of the medal round as Zhang was the last to finish his run.

The eventual podium finishers were at the horizontal bar during the last rotation with Oka being fifth in order and Zhang the last to perform.

After Oka tallied a 14.5 in his turn, Zhang needed to pull off an entertaining stunt in the H-bar to steal the gold from him.

Zhang eventually topped the H-bar, but his 14.633 score was not enough to win it all as he needed 14.9 or more.

British-Filipino Jake Jarman, who could be Yulo's biggest challenge in the vault and floor finals, finished seventh with 84.565 points, but he topped the floor with 14.9 and the vault with 15.166.

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