PARIS – Carlos Yulo will compete on Wednesday in the first of his three final events in the 2024 Olympics artistic gymnastics.

Keen eyes will be on him as he performs in the all-around competition, featuring both the floor exercise and the vault.

Cynthia Carrion, president of the Gymnastics Association of the Philippines, acknowledges that Yulo has a slim chance in the all-around competition. However, his participation is seen as a preview of his anticipated performances in the floor exercise and vault finals at the Bercy Arena this weekend.

The all-around championship, featuring 24 finalists, is expected to be a showdown among top gymnasts from China and Japan, with Fil-British athlete Jake Jarman considered a dark horse. Daiki Hashimoto aims to become the third Japanese gymnast to win back-to-back championships in this event, following in the footsteps of Sawao Kato (1968 and 1972) and Kohei Uchimura (2012 and 2016).

Other notable contenders include Shinnosuke Oka from Japan, Boheng Zhang of China (who topped the qualifiers), and Ruoteng Xiao, also from China. Great Britain’s Joe Fraser, Ukraine’s Oleg Verniaiev and Illia Kovtun, Italy’s Yumin Abbadini and Mario Macchiati, Americans Frederick Richard and Paul Juda, Switzerland’s Matteo Giubellini and Florian Langenegger, Hungary’s Krisztofer Meszaros, Australia’s Jesse Moore, the Netherlands’ Casimir Schmidt and Frank Rijken, Kazakhstan’s Milad Karimi, Brazil’s Diogo Soares, Canada’s Felix Dolci and Rene Cournoyer, and Germany’s Nils Dunkel round out the competition.

Zhang led the qualifiers with a score of 88.597, followed by Oka with 86.865, Hashimoto with 85.064, Xiao with 84.898, and Jarman with 84.897. Yulo’s qualifying score was 83.631.