The Philippines’ pride Carlos Yulo admitted that he is always honored to compete against 19-year-old Japanese junior standout Shinnosuke Oka.
Oka has been training with the 23-year-old Yulo at the Tokushukai Sports Center in Kamakura, Japan for the past months for the 2023 Asian Artistic Gymnastics in Singapore, which was concluded over the weekend.
The young Oka first burst into the scene back In 2019, when he won two gold medals, one silver medal, and one bronze medal at the 2019 Junior World Artistic Gymnastics Championships held in Győr, Hungary.
In Singapore over the weekend, Yulo settled for a bronze medal behind Oka in horizontal bars.
But the Filipino redeemed himself against the talented Oka with a gold medal in the parallel bars, with the Japanese settling for the silver medal.
“Sa Japan po, siya talaga ang nasa top. Kaya sobrang saya ko po talaga kahit pumangalawa ako sa kanya,” said Yulo.
Yulo said whenever he competes with Oka around, the Japanese gymnast always gets favorable scores during evaluations, and he gets to land somewhere in fifth and sixth places.
“Hindi po siya nagkakamali pag sa evaluation. Kaya sobrang saya ko po na konti lang ang diperensiya ng score namin sa Asian Championship,” added Yulo.
Yulo is now preparing for his next competition while taking a break in Manila. But, he does not see himself competing in the Hangzhou Asian Games this September.
Yulo said he will just focus his energies on preparing for the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Antwerp, Belgium.
The world meet has almost the same schedule as the Asiad, and Yulo believes that this bears more importance in his bid to earn spots in next year’s Paris Olympics.
“Iyun po ang mangyayari. Dapat sasali ako sa Asian Games sa China. Pero hindi na po,” said Yulo after members of the national team and officials of the Gymnastics Association of the Philippines paid a courtesy call to officials of the Philippine Sports Commission on Friday.
Gymnastics officials are pushing through plans to send a competitive roster to Asiad without Yulo, and have other members of Team Philippines join him for training in Japan.