Sinead Kerr and John Kerr were pleased to record a personal best in the compulsory dance section in Vancouver and sit eighth in the competition table. The pair, who hail from West Lothian, said they thought they could improve on that placing in the next two stages.

The Kerrs scored 37.02 for their performance at the Pacific Coliseum, leaving them only 6.74 points behind Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin, the Russian pair who currently occupy the gold medal position. With the final standings decided on the cumulative points total, the Great Britain pair could easily improve on their current standing in the coming days.

The pairs will compete in original dance on Sunday before the final section, free dance, decides the final placings on Monday. John Kerr said that two performances without mistakes could see them in the running for a medal finish.

"It was fine, it was fun. We skated pretty good and we were pretty happy with it," he said.

"We're confident we can build on this and we're pretty tight with the two teams above us so hopefully we can have two more clean skates and see what happens."

His sister Sinead was equally pleased with their first performance on the Vancouver ice.

"I felt pretty relaxed actually,” she added. ”The crowd had a really warm energy and it felt like that energy kind of poured onto the ice.

"We've been training really well leading up to this and we've got a personal best so we can't ask for more than that."

Fellow Brits Penny Coomes and Nigel Buckland look to be well out of the running after finishing in 21st place after the first day’s competition.