With the hat-trick in the singles and her fifth Olympic gold medal overall, luger Natalie Geisenberger drew level with Germany's winter record holder Claudia Pechstein.

The 34-year-old from Miesbach won the competition at the Winter Games in China on Tuesday ahead of Anna Berreiter from Berchtesgaden and Tatjana Iwanowa from Russia.

After victories in Sochi 2014 and Pyeongchang 2018, Geisenberger was the first female luger to win the individual competition for the third time in a row.

Since the 1998 games in Nagano, a German has always won the Olympic luge race.

Geisenberger can already win her sixth gold on Thursday and thus overtake the speed skating icon Pechstein.

Then the nine-time world champion will start in the team competition with Olympic champion Johannes Ludwig and a doubles duo that has yet to be nominated.

Germany had already won the first two team competitions in Sochi and Pyeongchang.

Geisenberger went into the finale with a lead of 0.330 seconds over Berreiter.

And as announced by head coach Norbert Loch, she achieved success with all her routine and ended up 0.493 seconds ahead of Berreiter.

For the top favorite Julia Taubitz, who fell the day before, it was finally enough for seventh place.

In the third run, Geisenberger was the first athlete to go down the 1,475-meter-long track in the mountains north of Beijing.

With starting number one, she immediately sent a signal to the competition with a track record of 58.226 seconds.

Berreiter, who came directly afterwards, also kept her nerves and consolidated her second place, which she did not let go of in the final round.