Carlos Yulo’s double Olympics gold highlights PH sports’ greatest year

Filipino Olympians receive a warm welcome from fans after the Heroes Parade on August 14 following their Paris Olympics campaign. –MARLO CUETO/INQUIRER.net

There is without a doubt that 2024 was the greatest year ever in Philippine sports, with Carlos Yulo highlighting that by winning two gold medals in one Summer Olympics.

There is also no doubt that in those Games in Paris, the Philippines was also the biggest laughing stock because of one regrettable, easy-to-avoid snafu that had its national lady golfers standing out for all the wrong reasons.

READ: Yearend 2024: Carlos Yulo and a golden year for Philippine sports

Yulo won the gold medals in the men’s floor exercise of artistic gymnastics before following this up with a victory in the vault for a twin kill that triggered a celebration across the archipelago in a country wanting to see heroes wherever it could find them.

From President Marcos to the ordinary Juan dela Cruz, Yulo received praise. And from everyone in the Philippines, its netizens most especially, one national sports association got blasted in whichever way possible for having its Olympics bets play without their uniforms and PH flag-labeled gears.

But before and after those things happening came a lot of other great achievements.

Alas and Gilas

Carlos Yulo bites his first gold medal as he celebrates victory in the men’s floor exercise at Bercy Arena.

Alas Pilipinas endeared itself to this country that has suddenly become enamored with women’s volleyball; Gilas Pilipinas made heads turn in Latvia during the Olympic Qualifying tournament and declared that it belonged, to name two.

Yuka Saso, a Philippine-born, Japanese-passport holding phenom in the LPGA, won her second US Women’s Open last June, before Rianne Malixi ruled the US Women’s Amateur and the US Junior Girls’ tournaments over the American Asterisk Talley to become just the second player to ever hold both titles on the same year.

It would have been a real banner year for golf, until the ruckus in Paris happened.

READ: Carlos Yulo camp not straying from golden blueprint

Still, 2024 will be all about the Olympics. With Yulo’s feat, the entire country will now be seeing the Games as one where the Filipino can excel. Gone now are the days that whenever a delegation was sent there, it was seen as token participation.

And Yulo will again be leading the way when the next edition unfolds in Los Angeles in 2028.

“Definitely. I’ll be there 100 percent,’’ said Yulo, when asked if he would be willing to go through it again for a shot at a repeat act. “Four years. It’s still a long way. I just hope I’ll be healthy and free from injuries.’’

The fame, the overwhelming reception by a grateful nation, and a guaranteed seat in the pantheon of Filipino sports heroes plus the riches that those victories brought, Yulo won’t grow tired of going through all the hardships for all of that all over again.

READ: Carlos Yulo silences doubters in historic feat at Paris Olympics

The 24-year-old dynamo and pride of Leveriza in Manila received a hero’s welcome from an adoring country and was showered with financial gifts from both the government and the private sector—which estimates have put at over P100 million—for all his hard work and separation from family to train abroad.

Yulo was expected to be a gold medalist as early as 2020 in Tokyo, where weightlifting celebrity Hidilyn Diaz-Naranjo was the one who broke the impasse of clinching an Olympic gold for the first time for a victory that ended nearly a century’s wait for the Philippines in the quadrennial meet.

Though she failed to make it to Paris and extend her Olympics stint to five straight, Diaz-Naranjo’s hunger remains as she eyes a comeback to the global sports spectacle four years from now.

For Yulo though, doing it one more time, or maybe more, is a given—and the entire country believes this with the newest sports hero still very much in the prime of his physical abilities.

Boxers and their bronzes

Bronze medalist Philippines’ Nesthy Petecio poses during a medals ceremony for the women’s 57 kg final boxing match at the 2024 Summer Olympics, Saturday, Aug. 10, 2024, in Paris, France. (AP Photo/John Locher)

Two other Filipino bets in lady boxers stood out in the glamorous French capital, with Nesthy Petecio securing a bronze medal an edition after bagging a silver in Tokyo in the women’s featherweight division, carving her legacy in stone as well.

Then there’s Aira Villegas, who also reaped a bronze in the women’s light flyweight division right on her first journey to the Olympic ring.

READ: With millions of incentives, Nesthy Petecio secures family’s future first

Bannered by Yulo’s golden performance, these achievements bested the Tokyo version of Diaz-Naranjo’s gold, the pair of silvers that boxer Carlo Paalam and Petecio took home, and the bronze medal of professional boxer Eumir Marcial.

With 22 Filipino athletes from nine sports, Paris 2024 didn’t end without a hitch for Team Philippines, especially after Dottie Ardina took to social media to air her disgust about having to tape the PH flag on her chest before every round of the women’s golf tournament at Le Golf Nacional.

“Sana all with uniforms,” Ardina said in a social media post that immediately went viral, especially after she and Bianca Pagdanganan were the only ones left with shots at gold for the Philippines in the final days of the Games.

“There are 22 athletes from the Philippines and we [together with Pagdanganan] are the only ones without [uniforms],” Ardina went on in Filipino. “We needed to buy T-shirts. My God, what kind of an Olympics [participation] is this?”

Best golf finish

Filipino golfer Dottie Ardina documenting how she has to tape on a badge of the Philippine flag in the absence of an official uniform for the Paris Olympics 2024 women’s golf competitions. –SCREENGRAB/GINA VALENCIA ARDINA FACEBOOK VIDEO

This controversy ran way after the Olympics, as even ordinary sports fans with little knowledge of golf demanded heads to roll in the National Golf Association of the Philippines. Even the Senate stepped in and investigated the snafu, which took a lot away from Pagdanganan’s joint fourth-place finish and Ardina’s 13th-place effort.

“Aside from not having the proper uniforms, we had no golf balls, head covers, gloves and golf umbrella. They only provided us with bags and golf shoes,’’ rued Ardina, who opted to break her silence for the sake of the next Filipino Olympians.

READ: Dottie Ardina’s second round proves she belongs at Paris Olympics

The long-hitting Pagdanganan ended up owning the honor as the highest-placed Filipino in women’s golf after she tied with Australia’s Hannah Green, Korea’s Amy Yang and Japan’s Miyu Yamashita. She bested the ninth-place effort of Yuka Saso, then still playing as a Filipino, in Tokyo 2020.

And coupled with Ardina tying for 13th despite playing with a heavy heart, the duo became the first Filipino pair to finish inside the top 15 of women’s Olympic golf, the controversy notwithstanding.

And like Yulo, Ardina said that she would gladly put on the PH uniform again, an appropriate one, if she’s asked to do this all over again.

“I’d do it all over again, with all my heart,” she had told the Inquirer in an exclusive interview upon coming home from Paris. “Since Day 1 of my junior days, I have been very proud to represent the Philippines. I’d do it until the end of my career.”

Yulo, meanwhile, would be facing controversy even before coming home, as social media feasted on his troubles with his mother.

Not liking Chloe

The falling out between mother and son started with the alleged mishandling of Carlos’ incentives from past international competitions, before the gymnast’s mother, Angelica, reportedly did not have a liking to her son’s girlfriend, Chloe.

Carlos has since urged his mom to move past the controversy and “move on,” as the family was dragged into public scrutiny.

“My message to you is to move on. I have forgiven you a long time ago,” Carlos said in Filipino in a TikTok video. “I also pray that you be safe always, and that you are always in a good place.”

He also pledged to stick it out with Chloe while saying, “Let’s stop all of this and celebrate the hardships and sacrifices of each Filipino athlete here in Paris.”

Take it from Carlos Yulo, PH sports will be moving on to create another banner year.