Yulo brothers strike gold, silver at Senior Artistic Gymnastics Asian tilt

Combination photo shows Eldrew and Carlos Yulo

Karl Eldrew Yulo via Facebook and AFP / Lionel Bonaventure

MANILA, Philippines — It started just as a dream.

And in Sunyi, China, it became a reality after brothers Carlos and Eldrew Yulo took the gold and bronze medals, respectively, on Saturday, June 20, in the floor exercise of the 13th Senior Artistic Gymnastics Asian Championships.

The more illustrious Carlos, an Olympic double-gold winner and many-time world champion, was at his usual magnificent self by coming through with a bedazzling 14.700 score in ruling his pet event for the fifth straight year.

It was also the 11th gold in this annual continental event for the pocket-sized wonder from Leveriza in Manila.

His feat was made more special by the fact that his younger sibling, Eldrew, who has made the jump to the senior level this year, came out of nowhere to snatch the bronze with a 14.300.

Japanese Shoma Tsukiyama snagged the silver with a 14.600.

Carlos and Eldrew are hoping to add up some more with the former plunging back into action in today’s parallel bars and horizontal bar finals and the latter in the horizontal bar.

Expect them to fight for it.

Gymnastic Association of the Philippines president Cynthia Carrion foresaw this even before it materialized.

“One hundred percent, unless one of them gets hurt, that’s the only thing I’m praying (does not happen),” said Carrion on the vision of seeing the Yulos qualifying and possibly winning in the greatest sports show on the planet — the Olympics — in Los Angeles in 2028.

Filipino fans should get familiar with the Yulos competing side-by-side again in future international competitions, including this September’s Asian Games in Japan, the World Championships in Rotterdam, the Netherlands later this year.

If the stars align, they would also be in Los Angeles.