Grand Prix de Paris: Sky Sports Racing's Jamie Lynch on Friday's Group One at ParisLongchamp

It is Bastille Day in France on Friday and that means it is also the Group One Grand Prix de Paris from ParisLongchamp, live on Sky Sports Racing.

Our expert analyst Jamie Lynch takes a deep dive into the formbook and analyses the chances of Oaks heroine Soul Sister, French Derby fourth Feed The Flame and a pair of Aidan O'Brien contenders.

FEED THE FLAME - Jockey: C Demuro | Trainer: P Bary

Sent off the 3/1 second-favourite, you might regard his fourth-placed finish - beaten seven lengths - in the Prix du Jockey Club as slightly underwhelming, but in retrospect it was a fine run, for various reasons.

Firstly, he was the least-experienced horse in the field having made his debut only in April, related to the second point which is that, in terms of rating achieved prior, he was at towards the bottom end and nowhere near the top among the 11-strong line-up; and thirdly, most critically, it was a fantastic edition of the Prix du Jockey Club, courtesy of Ace Impact and, to a lesser extent, Big Rock, while Feed The Flame shaped third-best on the day, the tow used by the winner for some of the straight while nosing into second briefly, the effort of which meant he was caught for bronze late on by the French Guineas winner Marhaba Ya Sanafi.

It was a harsh lesson for Feed The Flame in top-level racing, and how he comes out of it is the key, as he could recoil after going through the mill at a delicate stage of his development, but equally it might have made a man out of him, and, though by Kingman, he's bred to stay this new trip, being from the family of St Leger winner Rule Of Law.

With Christophe Soumillon suspended, Christian Demuro (rider of Ace Impact) gets a go on him, and the horse could yet make a true top-notcher, certainly the best of the French contingent in this spot: he already dealt with First Minister on just his second start.

RUBIS VENDOME - Andrea Atzeni | M Baratti

Looked to have his limitations exposed in the spring, including behind Winter Pudding, hence he was the 28/1 rank outsider in the Group 3 Prix du Lys at Chantilly last month, but the combination of firmer ground underfoot and Oisin Murphy on his back made a discernible difference to him as he beat the re-opposing Silawi by three-quarters of a length, the pair ahead of favourite Maniatic who has improved again since (chased home Horizon Dore), though that's still well short of Group 1 form.

Rubis Vendome is probably biting off more than he can chew here.

WINTER PUDDING - S Pasquier | A & G Botti

Already a winner over this course and distance, in April, but it was only at Listed level and he held all the aces that day with Maxime Guyon doing a deadly job of dictating.

Subsequently finished tailed-off last in the red-hot Prix du Jockey Club at odds of 66/1, which reflected his task, and this isn't much easier in truth.

ADELAIDE RIVER - R L Moore | A P O'Brien

Palinopsia is the phenomenon of visual distortion whereby you continue to see an image even when you've stopped looking at it. That was sort of the case in the Irish Derby, in the home straight, where you automatically focused on where your mind told you that you should, on Auguste Rodin, and yet your eye was constantly drawn back to Adelaide River through the penultimate furlong with the body language of Seamie Heffernan, who wasn't so animated nor aggressive as Ryan Moore at the same stage.

It's trite to say Adelaide River wouldn't have beaten Auguste Rodin that day (or any other) whatever the ride or whoever the rider. Though the truth about the quantifiable performances of the one-two and how the gap between them went from an 11-length chasm at Epsom to a one-and-a-half length connection at the Curragh is, as ever in racing, somewhere in the middle: no, Auguste Rodin wasn't near his best but, yes, Adelaide River did improve again, a stride rather than a step forward, with things in his favour, chiefly the steadyish pace he got away with setting.

Auguste Rodin may be pulling up Adelaide River but the rest from the Irish Derby are still dragging him down, and perhaps he's not the equivalent of Soul Sister.

PEKING OPERA - Tom Marquand | A P O'Brien

Ballydoyle is usually right when it campaigns a horse at a certain level, unless it's a pacemaker of course, but the evidence so far suggests that Peking Opera is neither up to this company nor a pacemaker, remembering the Irish Derby which basically passed him by, held up and never in the heat of the race, some seven-and-a-half lengths adrift of Adelaide River at the end.

FIRST MINISTER - B Murzabayev | A Fabre

An Andre Fabre project but a Coolmore production, by Galileo and a half-sibling to several Aidan O'Brien-trained horses who hit no great heights, though First Minister is already on a higher trajectory than those after he readily won the Group 3 Prix Hocquart over nearly 11 furlongs at ParisLongchamp last time, looking very straightforward into the bargain, tracking the pace before sealing the deal quickly.

However, the time before he had been put in his place by Feed The Flame, and a couple of the overseas raiders in here are way better than anything he faced in the Hocquart, but it's significant that Andre Fabre has freshened him up for this, a race he has won no fewer than 13 times.

SILAWI - M Guyon | C Laffon-Parias

Out of dual Group 1 winner Silasol but, in short, it's how to see how or why Silawi can make a meaningful impact in this considering he has finished behind a couple of these the last twice, in Group 3s, three-and-a-half lengths adrift of First Minister at ParidLongchamp then overhauled by Rubis Vendome at Chantilly, despite the run of the race from the front.

SOUL SISTER - K Shoemark | J & T Gosden

It's hard to rate it for now as anything other than an ordinary Oaks, given that close-up Caernarfon checked in only sixth in the Hampton Court, and that the time was significantly slower than the Coronation Cup that day, but there's more to Soul Sister than just the Oaks.

The only defeat of her career came in April on heavy ground, excusable on both counts, the yard slower than schedule in the spring, but she was mustard in the Musidora and, though the overall time of the Oaks was itself unimpressive, she did very well in personal terms, from last of all into the straight, by means of a fast-forward surge down the outside.

An English Classic winner who has been supplemented for a French Group 1, somewhat surprisingly, the mind naturally goes to Chaldean's capitulation at the weekend, but the big difference here is that Soul Sister bypassed Royal Ascot, meaning it's a full six weeks between runs for her, rather than the tight turnaround that maybe did for Chaldean.

It's 74 years since a filly won the Grand Prix de Paris (Bagheera was the last in 1949), though very few have tried - in fact Soul Sister is the first filly to even run in the race since the distance was changed to 1m 4f in 2005 - but her standards are high, as is her cruising speed, which helps with any eventuality, whether it's a classic French slow-then-sprint race or a more Ballydoyle-driven dynamic with their strong-staying pair.

JAMIE LYNCH'S VERDICT

It's hard to put an exact number on the ability of both Feed The Flame and Adelaide River, the former still radiating heat from one of the hottest French Derbys in years, while the latter took some heat himself after giving Auguste Rodin something to think about in the Irish Derby.

However, on balance, both have their work cut out with the Oaks winner SOUL SISTER who was even more impressive than the bare facts of Epsom and can do something that hasn't been done for three-quarters of a century by bringing some girl power to the Grand Prix de Paris.

Watch the Grand Prix de Paris from ParisLongchamp live on Sky Sports Racing (Sky 415 | Virgin 519) on Friday July 14.