Sochi (pps) Natalie Geisenberger is on the right track to claim her first gold medal at Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia: The 26-year-old luger from Germany clearly leads the rankings after two of four runs at the “Sanki Sliding Center”. Setting a track record of 49.891 seconds in her first run, Geisenberger has a leading margin of 0.766 seconds.

The fight for the silver and bronze medal in the women’s singles promises quite some excitement as eight lugers are within a margin of only half a second. After the first day, Germany’s Tatjana Huefner, 2010 Olympic and four-time World Champion, is in second position right behind Geisenberger. U.S. luger Erin Hamlin, 2009 World Champion, is in third position (0.818 seconds back).

Natalia Khoreva of Russia, who claimed the European gold medal in Sigulda, Latvia, two weeks ago, claimed fourth position (1.034 back) followed by Canada’s Alex Gough (1.052) , who ended the winning series of Germany’s women lugers after a string of 105 successive victories three years ago, and her team-mate Kimberly McRae (1.105). Russia’s two-time European Champion Tatiana Ivanova finished in seventh position (1.135 back).

Even Germany’s Anke Wischnewski (1.152 back), at age 36 the oldest participant in the women’s singles and on 8th place after two runs, can still dream of an Olympic medal as well as Martina Kocher (1.206) from Switzerland.