LAKE PLACID, N.Y. — Erin Hamlin hugged her American teammates and smiled wistfully.

"I'm sorry," Hamlin said Sunday after the United States finished sixth in the team relay event behind the winning German team at the Luge World Championships. "But I can't be disappointed. It's been good."

Both Hamlin and teammate Bengt Walden struggled on their starts, and any visions of another gold quickly vanished despite a solid run by doubles team Mark Grimmette and Brian Martin. The United States finished more than 4 seconds behind Germany.

"I had trouble at the start," said Hamlin, who won gold in women's singles on Friday to halt the German women's 99-race winning streak. "After that, it's pretty much hopeless. You lose so much time at the top. The run was good, not the start."

The U.S. won a team relay last year in a World Cup event here on their home track at Mount Van Hoevenberg, but the Germans won the team gold at the 2008 worlds in Oberhof, Germany, and duplicated that feat Sunday.

Felix Loch combined with Natalie Geisenberger, Andre Florschutz and Torsten Wustlich to easily best the Austrian quartet of Daniel Pfister, Nina Reithmayer, Peter Penz and Georg Fischler.

The Germans finished in 2 minutes, 39.630 seconds, 1.510 seconds ahead of the Austrians. The Latvian team of Guntis Rekis, Maija Tiruma, and brothers Andris and Juris Sics took the bronze, just ahead of Italy.

In the relay competition, each nation enters one male, one female and one doubles team in the race. The male slider starts first just like a normal race, but the female slider and the doubles team can only begin their runs once a gate in front of them opens, and that gate opens only when the previous slider punches a touch pad hanging above the track at the finish line. The clock starts when the first athlete begins his run and doesn't stop until the driver of the doubles sled hits the touch pad.

The Italian team of five-time world champion Armin Zoeggeler, Sandra Gasparini, Gerhard Plankensteiner and Oswald Haselrieder briefly threatened after Zoeggeler laid down the fastest run of the competition (50.978 seconds) to give his team a half-second edge. But the 18-year-old Gasparini struggled on her run, bouncing off a couple of walls and dragging her feet to send the Italians out of medal contention.

"It's a perfect end to the weekend," said the 19-year-old Loch, who beat Zoeggeler for the men's title on Saturday, his second straight at worlds.

The Russians did not finish and Canada was disqualified in the team event.

A year ago, the Germans were nearly perfect at worlds, taking nine of 10 medals.

This year they left Lake Placid with two golds and two silvers. The United States, Italy, and Austria each finished with two medals as six teams made it to the podium, the first time that many nations have shared in the medal haul at worlds in the event's 41-year history.