TURRACHER HOHE, Austria - Canadian alpine skier Erik Guay has pushed back his return to competition and will sit out the upcoming world championships.

The 33-year-old Olympian from Mont-Tremblant, Que., had surgery to replace cartilage and bone in his left knee in June after undergoing arthroscopic surgery on the same knee in March. His hope was be back on the slopes in January to prepare for the upcoming alpine world championships in Beaver Creek, Colo., the first week of February, however that will not happen.

"My on-snow training is progressing well at the moment," said Guay in a statement. "However I'm not ready to return to world cup racing quite yet. I've been working step by step towards being ready for World Cup competition in January, but after evaluating my progress, together with my team of coaches, we've decided a return to competition at Kitzbuhel is not in the cards."

Guay will miss the world championships, continuing his rehabilitation to insure he's 100 per cent ready for competition.

"My goal was to go into the world championships with some world cup racing under my belt and target a podium result at Beaver Creek, nothing less," said Guay. "Evaluating where I am now and what my performance expectation is for the world championships I've made the difficult decision to forgo the 2015 world championships. Now, we will focus our energies, and continue our program work, progressing toward a return to World Cup racing after the world championship period in late February."

Two weeks after his arthroscopic procedure in March, Guay was still experiencing pain and swelling in his knee. That's when he made the decision to have the more invasive surgery because he needed to get his "knee in a good place" as he still plans to represent Canada at the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics.

Guay, a three-time Olympian, won the men's world downhill championship in 2011 after claiming the World Cup overall title in super-G in 2010. Last season, he passed Steve Podborski for the most career World Cup medals won by a Canadian and now sits at 22.