Yet their marks were only good enough for a fourth place standing overall entering the long program Tuesday night — which puts them well away from their goal of winning an Olympic gold. In response to their scores the polite crowd let loose with its only boos of the night. Unlike the long program, which emphasizes artistry, the short program is intended to be a do-or-die test of certain technical skills.

"The judging was inconsistent with Ina and Dungjen," said Peter Nicks, the coach for rival U.S. pair Jenni Meno and Todd Sand, who finished sixth here. "That, of course, is what we expect. In figure skating, the judging is always inconsistent."

In first place were 1994 silver medalists Russia's Artur Dmitriev and Oksana Kazakova, despite their failure to execute the required death spiral. Germany's Ingo Steuer and Mandy Wotzel landed in second place after a clean program. In third were Russians Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze, the current European champions, whose program was interrupted by Sikharulidze's fall in the required side-by-side solo jumps.

When Dungjen's and Ina's marks were posted, Dungjen burst into laughter in the kiss-and-cry area. While the U.S. judge gave the pair his first place vote with two 5.7s, the Australian judge awarded a 5.4 and 5.3.

"I was really shocked at the Australian judge's numbers," said Peter Burrows, the coach of Dungjen and Ina. He "must have been judging a different event."

Tamara Moskvina, the coach for both of the Russian pairs, was not eager to dispute the judge's marks for her skaters and seemed to find the entire debate nonsensical. Despite Sikharulidze's fall, the lowest scores the pair received were two 5.4s. Despite the absent death spiral, Dmitriev and Kazakova received nothing lower than one 5.5.

"It's not my job to judge the judges," Moskvina said. "I think I teach well, as I have two couples here."

The pairs short program consists of eight required elements that include overhead lifts, pair spins and solo spins done in unison. The nine judges are instructed to deduct certain points for the omission or failure to complete certain elements.

"It looked like a 0.4" deduction to me, Nicks said about Sikharulidze's fall. "It was a real banger."

The fact of Ina's Japanese heritage might have had something to do with the crowd support they received. But even Japan's pairs team — last place finishers Marie Arai and Shin Amano — didn't receive as rousing an ovation from this seemingly sleepy audience, which was about 1,000 short of capacity. Though Arai and Amano were thrown more flowers, Dungjen pretended to dodge the numerous flowers he and Ina were thrown.

"We're not concerned about what other people do," Dungjen said. "The reason we're so happy is we accomplished what we wanted to. I can tell you, I know that's one of the best feeling's I've ever had because we skated clean."

Each of the top three pairs has had reason to celebrate recently, tonight's scores aside. Kazakova and Dmitriev are a relatively new team as they have skated together only two years. In his 10th year of international competition at 30 years old, he is trying to become the first man to win Olympic medals with different partners.

Woetzel and Steuer returned to training only 12 days ago. They missed about two months after Steuer was struck by a car in Dec. 8 on his way to practice. Walking on the side of the road, Steuer was brushed by the car's mirror and suffered a right shoulder injury that hasn't healed fully.

"It was painful, especially in the spin, but I had enough power to skate to the end," said Steuer. "The weather was changing today, it was snowing, and I can feel it in my shoulder."

Berezhnaya overcame a serious head injury when a former partner struck her with his skate blade during a side-by-side camel spin in 1996. Sikharuldze claims to have recently given up smoking and drinking.

"I just need to concentrate for my first Olympic Games," Sikharuldze, 21, said. "I'm very young."

Ina and Dungjen are still in the position of knocking on the door of international caliber figure skating. Ninth place finishers at the 1994 Olympic Games, Ina and Dungjen unseated three-time national champs Meno and Sand in 1997. They enter these Games trying to prove to the international judges that they are among the world's best.

Skating to Japanese drum music, they performed the short program better than they ever have, according to Burrows. And because the short program is worth only 33 percent of the overall score, the pair still has a chance for a gold medal. They do, however, need help. Their fourth place finish means that, to win the gold, they must win the long program and see today's leaders finish in third place or lower.

"Maybe," Burrows said, "we'll get a medal after the whole thing."

Ina and Dungjen, who embraced joyfully on the ice after competing, didn't seem worried about where they would finish. Ina, who was born in Tokyo but moved to New York City with her family at six months, seem far more interested in the crowd's response than the judges.'

"We had a wonderful time," she said. "It was so nice to have all the Japanese fans behind us, as well as all the foreigners."