MANILA, Philippines — Philippine gymnast darling Carlos Yulo could not land on the podium in the men's all-around finals of the World Gymnastics Championships in Liverpool, England on Friday (early Saturday, Manila time).
This was despite a masterful performance in his pet event floor exercise and the parallel bars.
Yulo finished 8th overall in the 24-man finals after struggling on the pommel horse and horizontal bar. He finished with 82.089 points — a good 5.000 behind gold medalist Daiki Hashimoto.
The Filipino was the early leader after a finals-best 15.166 on floor exercise. But a meager 11.900 on the pommel horse dragged him down to 12th place.
He dropped to as low as 13th with a 13.800 on the still rings, though he quickly rebounded with a strong showing in vault — the apparatus where he is the current world champion.
Despite a faulty landing, Yulo scored 14.166 on vault to return to the Top 10 after the vault. He then compounded it with a flawless parallel bars routine that netted him 15.166 points to help him ascend to sixth place.
Yulo slid to eighth with an 11.900 on the horizontal bar.
Still, it was an improvement for Yulo who did not make the all-around finals in the previous edition of the world championships in Japan.
There's more to come for Yulo as he gets a hance to defend his vault world title as well as regain his world championship in floor exercise in the apparatus finals on Sunday.
He also competes in the parallel bars final where he finished runner-up last year.