Filipinos have a complicated relationship with height.
On average, Filipinos are short. According to one study, Filipinos are the fifth shortest nation in the world.
Yet our most popular sport is a tall person’s game. The Philippines has always had skilled basketball players, but as the coaches say, you can’t teach height. The Philippines has not qualified for the Olympics in basketball since 1972. In sports, as in other aspects of life, even in romance, height is might. There are few more painful taunts in Filipino than “pandak,” an attitude reinforced by institutional discrimination in the form of minimum height requirements for a range of jobs.
Now here comes Carlos Yulo, all 4’11” of him. Not only is he the shortest in the Philippine Olympic delegation but one of the shortest in the entire Paris Olympics, exceeded in shortness perhaps only by another gymnast, USA’s Simone Biles, who measures a petite 4’8”.
Yulo and Biles also both happen to be multiple Olympic gold medallists.
Gymnastics is one of the few Olympic events where the lack of tallness provides an edge. According to a gymnastics website, “shorter people tend to have less mass than taller people so it will be quicker for them to tuck and rotate which is a huge advantage in gymnastics.”
Even in the realm of his sport though, Yulo is unusually short. The Pinoy tisoy British bronze medalist Jake Jarman seemed to tower over Caloy at only 5’2”.
The national basking in the reflected glory of Yulo’s double gold has predictably led to some bashing of the Filipino obsession with basketball. Too much attention and resources for a game for giants, the argument goes, at the expense of other endeavors where a short nation could actually win. It will probably take more than this moment for gymnastics facilities to begin occupying covered courts across the land.
But as the multitude of memes have shown us, ordinary people can practice landing or tumbling gracefully, and also hilariously, even while doing house work. And maybe among the short masses out there are future Caloys inspired by a new golden dream.
At the very least, Carlos Yulo has broken stereotypes with all his proud posing next to his girlfriend who looks statuesque next to him at 5’2”. Perhaps tall women need not feel so anxious anymore about finding a taller partner in a population of short men. Setting aside antiquated notions about height, they may have a higher chance of striking gold.
