Celebrating Austrians were a familiar sight at Garmisch railway station as the country's women skiers turned the German town into home territory during the world championships. Located on the line from Munich to Innsbruck and just 12kms from the border, Garmisch provided rich pickings with four of the five women's gold medals up for grabs won by Austrians.

World Cup leader Maria Riesch looked set to top the bill in her home village but the gifted all rounder could not even manage a silver lining, taking just two bronze medals. That was as good as it got for Germany. If one of Austria's golds was predictable -- Marlies Schild's in the slalom -- the other three were unexpected.

Elisabeth Goergl had only made it on the podium once in speed events this season, yet she was the star of the championships with her downhill and super-G gold medals, titles she took away from American Lindsey Vonn.

Like Riesch, Vonn spends Christmas in Garmisch every winter, but she went home with only one silver medal and the anticipated battle between the best two skiers failed to materialise. The same happened in the men's competition, in which Italy's Christoph Innerhofer stole the show, winning the super-G gold, the downhill bronze and the super-combined silver medals.

As a whole, most of the skiers who had made headlines since the start of the World Cup failed to deliver, namely runaway overall leader Ivica Kostelic whose sole contribution was a surprise bronze medal in the Super-G.

Erik Guay maintained a strong Canadian tradition by winning the downhill, taking over from injured team mate John Kucera. Logic prevailed in the technical events. American Ted Ligety and Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Grange had both won three World Cup races before the championships and they deserved their giant slalom and slalom crowns.

As for Schild, the second best slalom specialist of all time, she merely corrected an anomaly by winning a world championships gold medal at long last. Only one gold medallist, Aksel-Lund Svindal, had already won a world or Olympic title. The Norwegian retained his super-combined crown, his fourth gold medal in three world championships.

Young talents emerged such as Austria's Anna Fenninger, the super-combined winner while Italy's Federica Brignone and France's Tessa Worley also put down markers. German disappointment was tempered by a flawless organisation which could boost the chances of Munich's bid for the 2018 Winter Olympics.