By KRISTEL SATUMBAGA
Fil-American Emma Malabuyo bolstered her Paris Olympics bid after capturing the silver medal in the floor exercise at the FIG Apparatus World Cup on Sunday, Feb. 18. in Cairo, Egypt .
The 21-year-old California native displayed grace and flexibility to impress the judges who gave her 12.670 points – second best behind Japanese Mana Okamura who posted 13.070 points in clinching the gold.
The World Cup series are serving as qualifiers to the Paris Games where only the top two athletes per apparatus, based on the Olympic Qualification World Cup Ranking List, will be going to the fashion capital of the world.
The second leg of the World Cup series will be on Feb. 22 to 25 in Cottbus, Germany. The remaining two series will be on March 7 to 10 in Baku, Azerbaijan and April 17 to 20 in Doha, Qatar.
Malabuyo hopes to join fellow artistic gymnastics standouts Carlos Yulo and Aleah Finnegan to Paris after the two earned berths at the World Championships in Antwerp, Belgium last year.
A member of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) gymnastics team, Malabuyo was a former member of the US national team from 2016 to 2019 and 2021, and was an alternate for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
She joined the PH team only last year.
