Germany became the biggest winner on Wednesday by winning two out of six gold medals at the Sochi Olympics, including a third one from luge, while the Netherlands captured its fourth gold in five speed skating events.

World champions Tobias Wendl and Tobias Arlt set a track record to win the men's doubles luge, performing two flawless runs that reinforced Germany's domination in sliding sports. The German lugers have won three gold medals from as many events.

Wendl and Arlt beat two-time defending champions Andreas Linger and Wolfgang Linger of Austria to the second place in a combined time of one minute 38.933 seconds after two runs. Latvian siblings Andris Sics and Juris Sics bagged the bronze.

"It's a great honor for me to win the gold," said Wendl. "We can't really believe it. We knew we could race fast."

Germany's other gold medal was from Eric Frenzel in the men's nordic combined. The World Cup winner confirmed his status as the world's best in the event by holding off Akito Watabe of Japan.

Frenzel, also the current World Cup leader, finished in 23 minutes 50.2 seconds, adding the Olympic title to the world championship gold medal he won in the same event in 2011. Watabe took the silver and Norway's Magnus Krog won the bronze.

Germany tops the medal table with six gold, one silver and one bronze medals, followed by Canada, Norway and the Netherlands which each collected four golds.

Former world champion Stefan Groothuis won the men's 1,000 meters to continue the Netherland's dominance in speed skating. It was their fourth gold from five events.

Denny Morrison of Canada grabbed the silver and Michel Mulder added a bronze to the Dutch collection. Defending champion Shani Davis of the United States finished eighth.

Groothuis clocked a winning time of 1:08.39. "When I started, I didn't even know what the best time was and when I crossed the finish line, I was really surprised. It was the best time I've even skated on a low-altitude track," he said.

Chinese Pang Qing/Tong Jian, former world champions and silver medalists in Vancouver, missed a medal in their farewell show in the pairs figure skating.

The pair, who have been skating together for more than two decades, finished fourth with a total of 209.88.

Russia's reigning world champions Tatiana Volosozhar and Maxim Trankov skated to Jesus Christ Superstar, winning with 152.69 points in the free skate and 236.86 in total.

European runners-up Ksenia Stolbova and Fedor Klimov of Russia finished a clean free skate which earned a season best of 143.47 points. A total of 218.68 points was good enough to secure a silver.

Aliona Savchenko/Robin Szolkowy of Germany clinched the bronze with 215.78 points.

"We performed every element as best as we can. I didn't do the double axel very well," Pang said. "We're happy to have had the chance to skate our last performance at the Olympic Winter Games. It's an honor. We could have been luckier if we had won a medal."

Another Chinese pair Peng Chen/Zhang Hao, having paired up for less than two years, came eighth 195.72 points.

"Altogether, we skated three programs here, two short and one free (team event short program). We've been skating together for less than two years. This is not enough, we need more practice and we'll have better results next season," said the 30-year-old Zhang, silver medalist at the Turin Games with previous Zhang Dan.

Tina Maze of Slovenia and Dominique Gisin of Switzerland shared the gold medal in the women's downhill, the first time this has happened in Alpine skiing at an Olympic Winter Games.

The women's half-pipe gold went to Kaitlyn Farrington of the United States, who scored 91.75 points on her second run. Torah Bright of Australia took the silver with 91.50 and another American Kelly Clark had the bronze in 90.75.

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