Shaun White Pulls out of Sochi Slopestyle!
The leadup to the Slopestyle is getting more interesting by the day as Shaun White drops out!
Shaun White has backed his words up with actions today after pulling out of the Slopestyle event. Speaking about his decision Shaun had the following to say.
"After much deliberation with my team, I have made the decision to focus solely on trying to bring home the third straight gold medal in halfpipe for Team USA," he said.
"With the practice runs I have taken, even after course modifications and watching fellow athletes get hurt, the potential risk of injury is a bit too much for me to gamble my other Olympics goals on.
"The difficult decision to forego slopestyle is not one I take lightly as I know how much effort everyone has put into holding the slopestyle event for the first time in Olympic history, a history I had planned on being part of."
After dropping out of the X-Games it seems Shaun is approaching the Halfpipe as an all or nothing event as he tries for a third successive gold medal in the Halfpipe.
Course designner Roberto Moresi sees no further issues with the course at the Rosa Khutor Extreme Park. "It's only him (White) that's pulled out, but people had already started to get into the course and like it a lot, We came out of a meeting with the snowboarders and they're starting to really appreciate and enjoy it."
The event has already seen Norway medal hope Torstein Horgmo drop out due to injury, but there will be no shortage of hungry riders lining up tommorrow as the event kick off.
British hopes Billy Morgan and Jamie Nicholls start their bids to qualify for the slopestyle finals, which is making its Winter Olympics debut, at 06:00 GMT before triple X Games gold medallist Jenny Jones and Aimee Fuller do likewise in the women's event from 10:00 GMT!
