Brandon O’Neill packed his bags after his first international competition in more than a year and half and headed home to Edmonton on Friday from the Chinese national championships ready to pick up where he left off before injuries stopped him on his tracks. At the Beijing Olympics O’Neill’s Olympic medal hopes were shattered by what turned out to be a broken ankle just days before the competition. He competed anyway, thinking it was a severe sprain, but despite a gusty performance was not a threat. After coming back from the damaged ankle he competed at the 2009 world championships but the comeback was shortlived. At a training camp early in 2010 in tore knee ligaments and after another difficult rehab returned to competition at Elite Canada this past March. In China, O’Neill competed in an historic team event, the first time a foreign country has been invited to its national championships and was the top Canadian on floor and parallel bars, earning him a spot in both event finals and placed seventh in both. While his parallel bars routine went well on the final day of competition Thursday O’Neill couldn’t say the same about his floor final the day before.

“The floor final didn’t go as well as I would have liked so I just wanted to go out and do a nice routine on parallel bars,” said O’Neill, one of the world’s top gymnasts on floor before his injuries.

“The Chinese are the best in the world, especially on parallel bars where they have the world champion, and I feel that with a little more difficulty in my routine, I’ll be able to compete with the top guys.”

Despite a few rough patches in his floor routine, O’Neill said he just needs to work out the wrinkles when he gets back home.

“It’s a new routine and was my first international competition in more than a year and a half so nerves probably played a little bit into it too. But the difficulty is there for the worlds in October so all I have to do is get the consistency going and make sure I’m in good shape.”

In Thursday’s other final, Jayd Lukenchuk, placed seventh, adding to a better than expected 12th all around earlier in the competition.

“It felt great to place ahead a couple of the Chinese guys,” said Lukenchuk, one of several promising members of the Canadian men’s team vying for a spot at the 2012 Olympics.

“I nearly missed the bar on one of my releases moves and crashed but it I just managed to hang on".