CARLOS Yulo captured his second gold medal in as many days at the 20th Asian Games, ruling the vault by the slimmest of margins against Mahdi Olfati of Iran at the Nagoya General Gymnasium Rainbow Hall.
Yulo put together an average of 14.599 to take the medal in the apparatus where he is the reigning Olympic champion, duplicating his victory last Wednesday n the floor exercise which he also ruled in the Paris Games.
READ Yulo waited eight long years for Asian Games redemption
He got a worthy challenge this time from Olfati, who looked on pace to steal the gold in Vault 1 with a competition-high 15.100. But he only registered 13.966 in Vault 2 after failing to complete a clean landing, opening the door to Yulo.
Yulo heaved a sigh of relief after the scores of the Iranian gymnast were shown on the big screen: Olfati's average of 14.533 was just 0.066 behind the two-time Olympic champion.
A gold medal in the vault looked unlikely after the 26-year-old Yulo almost missed the final due to poor start that saw him fall on his landing. He barely made it to the medal round by finishing seventh.
Yulo, however, was at his best during the final, recording a score of 14.733 on his first vault with a 5.6 difficulty score and 9.133 execution score.
Olfati had a 5.6 difficulty score and 9.400 execution score while also gaining a 0.1 bonus score in his first vault, but was penalized by 0.1 in the second vault for stepping out of bounds after recording 5.2 difficulty score and 8.866 execution score.
Juancho Miguel Besana placed fifth in the vault final with an average score of 13.783.
Yulo, who failed to medal in his Asian Games debutin 2018 and was forced to skip the 2022 Asiad due to a conflict in schedule, goes for his third gold medal of the competition in the parallel bars later in the day.
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