Adam Rippon and Maia Shibutani and Alex Shibutani withdrew from the world figure skating championships in three weeks, joining a list of Olympic medalists who will miss the event in Milan, Italy.
Rippon is replaced by Max Aaron, who joins PyeongChang Olympians Nathan Chen and Vincent Zhou in making up the three-man U.S. team.
Aaron was the third alternate behind Sochi Olympian Jason Brown and U.S. silver medalist Ross Miner, who passed on the worlds spot after Rippon gave it up. A rep for Rippon did not specify why he decided against worlds.
Rippon, an Olympic team event bronze medalist, said after he finished 10th in singles in PyeongChang that he didn’t know if he would compete at worlds.
Many skaters skip the world championships after the Olympics due to exhaustion or off-the-ice opportunities.
The Shibutani siblings were the lone Americans to earn Olympic medals outside of the team event. They said earlier this week that they were unsure if they would compete at worlds.
They are replaced in the worlds field by Kaitlin Hawayek and Jean-Luc Baker, who were fourth at nationals.
Other notable skaters missing worlds:
Patrick Chan (CAN) -- Widely reported to have retired
Meagan Duhamel/Eric Radford (CAN) -- Retired
Tessa Virtue/Scott Moir (CAN) -- Possibly retiring
Javier Fernandez (ESP) -- Possibly retiring
OlympicTalk is on Apple News. Favorite us!
