IT was interesting to hear trainer Karl Burke call this week for an overhaul of the start of the turf flat season, claiming that the way the relative dearth of turf action between the Lincoln and the Craven meeting at Newmarket leaves the flat feeling, well, flat.

In order to create more of a fanfare, Burke has suggested moving the Lincoln to the weekend immediately before Newmarket’s traditional midweek fixture, and it’s hard to argue that it would be much easier to maintain the excitement of the season’s curtain-raising fixture with the knowledge that the season’s first meaningful classic trials would follow immediately.