‘94 WINTER OLYMPICS / LILLEHAMMER : Disappointing End for U.S. Mogul Skier : Freestyle: Defending champion Weinbrecht is seventh. Teammate McIntyre wins silver.

Wednesday’s mogul final at the Kanthaugen Freestyle Arena was as much about the loser as the winner, as much about seventh place as first.

It was about Donna Weinbrecht, the Bambino of Bumps, defending Olympic champion, the winner of 30 World Cup races.

The best mogul skier ever.

Weinbrecht has been on the podium so many times she didn’t know how to react to seventh place. Where should she stand? Were there parting gifts?

“I have never been down that far before,” she said.

Weinbrecht, inexperienced in such things, was gracious enough in defeat.

Stine Lise Hattestad, who, like the rest, had long skied in Weinbrecht’s shadow, at last could bask as she claimed the gold medal on home snow, as jubilant Norwegians waved flags and sang choruses of their anthem, “Victory Is Ours.”

Hattestad claimed the gold with a winning score of 25.97, enough to defeat Liz McIntyre, the American veteran who managed to wait out Weinbrecht long enough to earn the silver.

Russia’s Elizaveta Kojevnikova, who finished second to Weinbrecht at Albertville, earned the bronze. Sensing it might never get any better, Hattestad announced her retirement afterward. Defeating Weinbrecht brought bewilderment.

“I don’t think I quite understand what I’ve done yet,” Hattestad said.

Added McIntyre: “I don’t think it’s really hit me.”

For McIntyre, a Dartmouth graduate, skiing behind Weinbrecht certainly has been an education. In seven years on the U.S. team, McIntyre has won two World Cup events.

Twenty-eight fewer than Weinbrecht.

Yet, when it counted, it was McIntyre who raced like a champion. There was some argument, in fact, whether hers was the gold-medal run.

“I was very well prepared,” McIntyre said. “I had a lot of fun. I’m a happy camper in Norway. I tried to stay pretty calm about the whole thing and treat it like a World Cup. The fact I’m at the Olympics really hasn’t crossed my mind yet. I think tomorrow I’ll start enjoying the Olympics.”

Weinbrecht, on a comeback quest to defend her Olympic gold after tearing knee ligaments in 1992, was not her usual self, despite winning the first six World Cup competitions this season.

A week before the Olympics, Hattestad defeated her at a World Cup event at Salen, Sweden.

Tuesday, in the elimination round, Weinbrecht bobbled after one of her jumps and finished sixth. Although first-day scores don’t carry over, the starting order for finals is arranged in reverse order, from worst to best. It is generally agreed that impressing the judges is more difficult from the middle of the pack.

Not that Weinbrecht deserved to win. She said she felt numb in the starting gate, “like an out-of-body experience.”

Weinbrecht clearly had been spooked by Tuesday’s error. Later that night, in her room, she cried.

“I got up in the middle of the night and I kept seeing the mistake I made,” she said. “I kept playing that over and over in my head.”

She can admit now that standing in the starting gate has been hell all season with those doubts in her head and that heavy brace protecting her right knee.

Even as she was winning World Cup races, Weinbrecht would call her mother and say, “Pray for me. I can’t do it. I can’t get down the course.”

Weinbrecht was losing her mental edge. Maybe it was the injury. Or indifference.

Yet, she wanted to see the comeback through.

“I think I’d regret it more if I was on the couch watching the Olympics,” she said.

At 28, there are no more moguls left to conquer, though. Retirement appears imminent.

“I feel like that right now,” Weinbrecht said. “I gave it my best shot.”

Before, her best shot was enough.

“I have to be very thankful for all the accomplishments I’ve had,” she said. “I have a gold medal and I’ve been a champion. It’s all right. I wish things could have gone better. But it just didn’t happen and I’ve got to be a champion without the gold.”

Later, surrounded by her family in the freestyle coral, Weinbrecht thanked supporters who made the trip. She hugged her parents.

“I don’t want you to be disappointed,” said her mother, Caroline. “I thought you did great.”

Despite the loss, Weinbrecht was elated for McIntyre, calling her performance “awesome.”

Weinbrecht said she thought McIntrye had won.

As for the U.S. men, Troy Benson, who made the Olympic team only because of an injury to a teammate, finished eighth in the finals.

“That’s all I could have really hoped for,” he said. “I was right where I deserved to be.”

American Sean Smith finished 13th in the event, won by Canada’s Jean-Luc Brassard. Serguei Shoupletsov of Russia took the silver, with Edgar Grospiron of France winning the bronze.

Benson had mixed feelings about the day. His own joy and elation for McIntyre was tempered by Weinbrecht’s finish.

“You know,” Benson said, “sometimes somebody has to step down before somebody else can step up.”