Both Belgian women defeated a Polish woman in the first round. Gheysens was 0.092 faster than Marlena Karwacka, Devluchte was four thousandths of a second under Urszula Los’s time.
In the qualifications earlier in the day, Gheysens finished fourteenth and Devluchte sixteenth. Devluchte opened the competition and improved her own Belgian record by five hundredths to 10,724. Gheysens did even better a little later and improved the national best time to 10.652. Britain’s Emma Finucane set a new world record with 9,759.
29-year-old Devluchte is riding her first international championship in Konya since the birth of her first child last summer. Gheysens celebrates her 19th birthday in Turkey on Tuesday.
