THREE group races at 1600 metres at ParisLongchamp on Sunday promised some ready comparisons, but in the end there was more contrasts than similarities to be found when comparing each race.

The Prix du Moulin for older horses was run in a time – 1m 36.00s – over 4.0s quicker than the Prix d’Aumale (1m 40.51s) and the Prix des Chenes (1m 41.12s) for two-year-olds. The last two were notably slowly-run, and even the Moulin was a little stop-start. Fortunately, sectionals are a lot of help in unravelling what went on.