COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- It's not that Michelle Kwan wants to be alone. She feels she needs to be alone.

So Kwan went it alone Thursday night and didn't seem much worse off for it. While it wasn't close to vintage Kwan at Skate America, the five-time U.S. and four-time world champion won a sloppy women's short program.

"I would not say it was a victory. I don't feel I skated to my potential," Kwan said after she made an atypical error that severely lowered her scores. Not that having longtime coach Frank Carroll with her would have made any difference when Kwan botched a triple flip.

"I guess a coach, or no coach, you have to do it yourself. Someone might hold your hand, but they can't hold your hand all the way through."

Kwan, 21, didn't seem unnerved by the decision earlier this week to split with Carroll with the Olympics less than four months away -- or by much of anything else in the first competition of the season. She simply goofed enough to get technical marks ranging from 5.0 to 5.4.

Her presentation marks for her routine to "East of Eden," -- the same music she used in the short last season -- boosted her past her main American competition, Sarah Hughes. But Kwan lacked passion.

"There was a bunch of uncertainty," she said. "You try to do your own thing, but without knowing what it will be like, will it be huge news or what? You still have to do it, regardless."

Kwan's father, Danny, stood where Carroll normally would at the sideboards, but they didn't converse.

"Not really. I see him all day," she said with a laugh. "What is going to say, `Don't forget to breathe?"'

Danny Kwan refused to sit in the kiss-and-cry area with his daughter, so Wendy Weston-Enzmann, a U.S. team leader, accompanied her. In essence, though, it was a solo show for Kwan.

"I want to collect myself, get myself together and take authority in my skating," she said.

Hughes cut a double loop to a single loop at the end of her triple lutz combination jump and also was slow. The U.S. runner-up and bronze medalist at the 2001 worlds admitted she was "a little disappointed in the loop, I've been doing it all week."

"I was a little cautious tonight," the 16-year-old Hughes added. "I felt good going into it and I was too excited -- I was over myself and in perfect position -- and I just messed it up."

The other American, Sasha Cohen, who turns 17 Friday, was fourth behind Russia's Viktoria Volchkova heading into Saturday's free skate. Cohen missed last season with a back injury after finishing second at the 2000 nationals.

World champions Jamie Sale and David Pelletier of Canada won the pairs short program, worth one-third of the total score. The pairs finish on Friday.

"It was a very good start to our season. It was our best performance of the season -- so far," Pelletier said, chuckling.

The couple changed coaches this year, despite winning their first world title in March. They looked just as strong in opening this season with a playful routine to "Jalousie."

"We were nervous," Sale admitted. "It was the first time for this program in competition."

Two-time American champs Kyoko Ina and John Zimmerman got off to a rare strong start and were second. Ina showed no signs of the right shoulder injury she suffered in August.

"It doesn't limit what we do, it only limits the amount of stuff we can do, how many times we practice," Ina said.

Usually, Ina and Zimmerman struggle at the outset of the season. They had no problems this time while skating to a bluesy version of Pink Floyd's "Diamond," and "Shine On."

"It's a big relief," she said. "We were talking about how great we were feeling before we came to Colorado. There was anticipation right before we got on, the hope that the feeling we have is what we can do on the ice."

The other American couples were Danielle and Steve Hartsell, who were sixth, and Laura Handy and Jonathon Hunt, who stood seventh out of nine pairs.

Canada's Shae-Lynn Bourne and Victor Kraatz, the most experienced couple in the ice dancing field, won the compulsory dance.

Bourne and Kraatz, skating the Ravensburger Waltz, were ahead of Lithuania's Margarita Drobiazko and Povilas Vanagas, who edged Bourne-Kraatz for the bronze medal at the 2002 world championships. The Canadians have won four bronze medals at worlds.

Americans Tenith Balbin and Benjamin Agosto were fifth, while Jessica Joseph and Brandon Forsyth were eighth out of 10 teams.

The original dance is Friday and the free dance is Saturday.