Carlos Yulo won the men's floor exercise at the Asian Games in Nagoya, Japan, on Thursday, September 24, giving the Philippines its first gold medal of the 2026 Games. The two-time Olympic champion scored 14.666 points in the apparatus final at Nagoya City General Gymnasium, according to Reuters, AFP and Philippine news reports. It was his first Asian Games title.
The final was decided by narrow margins. Kazakhstan's Milad Karimi took silver with 14.600, just 0.066 behind Yulo, while Japan's Shoma Tsukiyama earned bronze with 14.566. The Philippine News Agency reported that Yulo's routine carried a difficulty score of 5.7; GMA News put his execution score at 8.966. The three medalists were separated by one tenth of a point.
Yulo, 26, arrived with major titles already on his record. He won floor exercise and vault gold at the 2024 Paris Olympics, becoming the first Filipino to claim multiple Olympic gold medals. He had also won world and Asian gymnastics titles, but had missed the podium in his previous Asian Games appearance in 2018. Thursday's result filled that gap in his career record, AFP reported.
The final also included Yulo's younger brother Karl Eldrew, who finished seventh with 12.233, according to GMA News. Reuters reported that Yulo developed his gymnastics in Japan under a scholarship from its Olympic committee and competed before a Nagoya crowd familiar with his training history. AFP said he expressed particular satisfaction that the breakthrough came in a country where he has spent much of his training career.
After the event, Yulo told reporters that the Asian Games medal completed his collection of major championships, according to Reuters and AFP. He described feeling overwhelmed, while looking ahead to another final. For the Philippine team, the victory ended its wait for a gold medal at this edition of the Games, a result confirmed by the Philippine News Agency and GMA News.
Yulo is scheduled to compete in the vault final on Friday at the same Nagoya venue, Reuters and AFP reported, offering a chance to add a second Asian Games title. The floor result is already a milestone: his first gold at the continental multi-sport event, secured by a margin of less than seven hundredths of a point over Karimi.
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