CAIRO, Egypt, March 18, 2022 – Paul Juda (Deerfield, Ill./University of Michigan) advanced Friday to the men’s vault, parallel bars and horizontal bar finals on the second day of qualifications for the FIG Apparatus World Cup in Cairo, Egypt, with teammate Ian Lasic-Ellis (Dover, Mass./Stanford University) set to join him in Sunday’s horizontal bar final. In all, three U.S. athletes earned seven spots across this weekend’s apparatus finals, which will be held at the Cairo International Stadium.

Juda qualified on vault in the fifth position, posting individual scores of 14.400 and 14.066 for a combined 14.233. Ukraine’s Nazar Chepurnyi paced the field with a 14.816, while Armenia’s Artur Davtyan (14.600) and Israel’s Artem Dolgopyat (14.449) rounded out the top three.

On parallel bars, Juda’s 14.266 landed him fourth in the qualification round behind Cypress’ Marios Georgiou (14.500), Ukraine’s Illia Kovtun (14.500) and Turkey’s Ferhat Arican (14.400). Lasic-Ellis was 14th with a 13.466.

Both gymnasts advanced on horizontal bar. Juda qualified in the third spot with a 13.933, while Lasic-Ellis was sixth with a 13.233. Georgiou led the way with a 14.100, edging Italy’s Carlo Macchini by a tenth of a point.

Juda and Lasic-Ellis delivered the top-two scores during floor exercise qualifications Thursday. They will look to repeat that feat in the floor final Saturday at 7 a.m. ET. Specialist Alex Diab (Glen Ellyn, Ill./U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Training Center) was the lone U.S. athlete to advance to Saturday’s still rings final slated to begin at 9:15 a.m. ET.