Murielle Ahoure continued her quest to become the Ivory Coast’s first global athletics gold medallist when she sped to 7.06 to win the first of three semi-finals. It was not the quickest of starts for Ahoure but she picked up rapidly and powered away from her rivals in the second half of the race to finish just 0.03 away from her 2014 world-leading mark, notching up her ninth straight win (including heats) since the start of the year. Nigeria’s Gloria Asumnu followed her home 0.05 in arrears to take the second automatic qualifying place for the final later on Sunday. German’s 2010 European 100m champion Verena Sailer took the second semi-final after edging in front in the final 20 metres to equal her personal best of 7.12.USA’s 2005 world long jump champion Tianna Bartoletta had a poor start but came through strongly to also secure her place in the final with second place in 7.14.Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce was another athlete who will be having a think about her reaction to the gun for the final and Jamaica’s 2013 World Athlete of the Year had to work hard to come through to win but she showed her class to take the third heat in a season’s best of 7.08.Asha Philip, from Great Britain, showed her growing maturity and developing talent by equalling her personal best in 7.09, the fastest time by a European this winter, when taking second place behind the triple gold medallist from the 2013 IAAF World Championships. Jamaica’s Veronica Campbell-Brown and Trinidad’s Michelle-Lee Ayhe qualified for the final as the fastest non-automatic qualifiers, after finishing third in the last two semi-finals respectively. Phil Minshull for the IAAF

Murielle Ahoure continued her quest to become the Ivory Coast’s first global athletics gold medallist when she sped to 7.06 to win the first of three semi-finals.

Report: women's 60m semi-finals – Sopot 2014

Ivory Coast’s Murielle Ahoure, who first came to international attention when she won the silver medal two years ago in Istanbul, looked remarkably relaxed just before stepping into her block ahead of the sixth and final 60m heat and was blowing kisses to the crowd.However, as soon as the gun went she had her game face on and sped to the fastest time of the morning in 7.09, quickly into her running just being a little bit slower than she would have liked over the first five metres.Hailing originally from a country that is football-mad, although she is based for most of the year in the USA, she can reasonably claim to being her country’s greatest ever sportswoman and that position would certainly be enhanced if she were to take the gold medal in Sopot.However, to do that she will have to beat the double world champion and 2013 World Athlete of the Year, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.The Jamaican pocket rocket won her heat in the second-fastest time of the morning, 7.12, despite the rather sedentary reaction time of 0.203.With the relatively relaxed qualification conditions of the first three in each heat and six non-automatic qualifiers going through to Sunday’s semi-finals, nobody with medal ambitions fell by the wayside at this stage.The other heat winners were Great Britain’s Asha Philip, Germany’s 2010 European 100m champion Verena Sailer, Nigeria’s Gloria Asumnu and the USA’s Tianna Bartoletta. Sailer and Bartoletta were only fractionally slower than the leading pair, both women clocking 7.13 in winning their races.Phil Minshull for the IAAF

Ivory Coast’s Murielle Ahoure, who first came to international attention when she won the silver medal two years ago in Istanbul, looked remarkably relaxed just before stepping into her blocks ahead of the sixth and final 60m heat and was blowing kisses to the crowd.

Report: women's 60m semi-finals – Sopot 2014

Report: women's 60m heats – Sopot 2014