ESPN Gymnastics

LONDON -- Keep this up, and Kohei Uchimura will have a world title to go with his Olympic silver medal.

Uchimura lived up to his favored status Tuesday, cruising to the top spot after the first two sessions of qualifying at the world gymnastics championships. His score of 90.925 points was more than 1½ points better than anyone else, with one session left.

"I think I could win the gold medal if I hit every routine," Uchimura said through a translator. "But who knows? It depends on the performances and the routines that day."

Maxim Deviatovski of Russia, the leader after the first session, is second with 89.350 points and American Tim McNeill, competing at his first major international competition, is a surprising third with 88.775 points. Britain's Daniel Keatings is fourth while U.S. champion Jonathan Horton is fifth after a fall on the pommel horse.

Scores start over, however, in Thursday's all-around final.

"You know what's great about today? It's prelims," said Horton, who estimated he could score at least 2½ points higher than the 88 he had Tuesday.

He'll need every one of them to catch Uchimura.

Japan has a long history of elegant gymnasts, but few knew much about Uchimura before last year's Beijing Olympics. Just 20, he'd never been to the world championships and Hiroyuki Tomita was considered the Japanese gymnast with the best chance to challenge Yang Wei of China.

Instead, it was the mop-topped Uchimura. And with Yang, Tomita and 2004 Olympic champion Paul Hamm gone, he is clearly the one everyone is now chasing, especially with European champion Fabian Hambuechen out with a bum foot and Horton unable to master the pommel horse.

"The Beijing Olympics, it's a past thing," Uchimura said. "We're all starting from scratch."

Uchimura appears to have no flaws, doing each of his routines with smooth control. On still rings, he moved from one strength position to another so easily he almost seemed to have a motor attached to him.

His high bar routine had the crowd oohing and aahing, getting so much air on his release moves he could have thrown in another somersault. Yet he does each skill with such precision it's almost as if they're in slow motion.

Uchimura isn't perfect, though. He under-rotated his vault and stumbled backward several steps to keep himself from falling on his backside.

But it wasn't enough to threaten his lead -- especially after Horton botched his pommel horse routine.

The American champion arrived at worlds brimming with confidence, a silver medal on high bar and a surprise team bronze at the Beijing Olympics giving him the confidence to know he really does belong among the best of the best. And after four events, he trailed Uchimura by a mere .125 points.

Too bad for Horton he still had to do pommel horse, his longtime nemesis. He might have won an all-around medal in Beijing if not for his shaky horse routine. Ditto for the 2007 worlds, where he missed the bronze medal by a measly two-tenths of a point.

He'll get a do-over in the all-around final, but he can't afford another routine like this one.

"I'm not going to say it was an uncharacteristic fall on pommel horse, because that tends to happen to me," Horton said. "But I feel like I'm swinging much, much better on pommel horse than I ever have. I've been much more consistent in training with that routine."

Horton made one save after getting off balance midway through his routine, but he seemed to run out of gas near the end, stalling and taking a seat on the horse. He got off and slowly walked to put more chalk on his hands as coach Tom Meadows jumped up on the podium to give him a few words of encouragement.

Horton finished without any more mishaps, but he was clearly dejected. He scored a 12.8, dropping him more than two points behind Uchimura going into the final event.

Horton also went out of bounds on floor and had a messy landing on vault, mistakes he doesn't usually make. But that will drive him harder Thursday.

"I can do so much better," he said.

Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press