It is trendy in racing to say that races such as last Saturday's William Hill Lincoln are for boring old has-beens and bar entry to exotic unexposed horses. It must be: Richard Fahey said so on The Morning Line and fellow trainer William Haggas, among others, agrees. But is it true? And, if it is, should we care?

The premise of handicaps is to equalise ability by the application of weight, with the aim of producing competitive races. Each horse in training earns a centralised official rating. The better a horse's form, the higher its rating and the more weight it carries in handicaps.

As a rule, horses now need to be rated much higher than was formerly required to qualify for these popular races. For example, in 1989 the lowest-rated horse in the Lincoln field was 81. In 1999, it was 77. In 1992, Haggas won it with High Low, who was rated 75. Yet this year, the lowest rating was 94 - and that horse finished last.

The complaint is that these highly rated fields are clogged with senior, exposed handicappers, incapable of winning and whose rating is based on past exploits rather than present ability. This prevents younger horses with greater potential from competing - or so the argument goes, most often advanced by those who train, own, tip or back these horses.

Yet this year's Lincoln was won by a four-year-old, the youngest eligible age group, and the runner-up, although eight years of age, carried top weight and is a far better horse now than two years ago. Of the 22 horses declared to run, only four had failed to win at least one race last season, suggesting they are not overrated. Meanwhile, Zaahid, the much touted ante-post favourite who missed the cut, could not even win the consolation race.

The criticism is actually as odd as it is erroneous. Only a few years ago, it was said that Britain provided insufficient targets for highly rated older horses, resulting in too many of them being sold to Dubai or America. Is it not a good thing that those formerly dubbed “twilight” horses, because they were weighed down in handicaps but lacked the ability to win group races, have been found a valuable competitive outlet?

And what can possibly be wrong with requiring young, improving horses to earn their place in these iconic handicaps by winning a succession of lesser contests? Was it not always the contention that handicaps are an incentive to cheat because they encourage trainers to mask a horse's true ability to ensure its handicap mark was more than favourable?

The official handicapper can only allot a rating on the basis of what can be seen on the track. If horses must reveal a higher level of form to take part in these races and trainers have to respond by campaigning their horses more openly as a result, so be it. Once this becomes the overriding ethos of British handicapping, many people would be more inclined to campaign for overrated horses to be dropped in the weights more quickly.

British racing should not encourage cheats to prosper nor foster the belief that suddenly winning a handicap with a horse that is really group class is in any way clever. Problem? What problem?

The case of Michael Wigham exposes a loophole in the integrity of British racing. This trainer was found guilty of - in the words of the disciplinary panel - “cheating”, twice within 13 days with the same horse. He had already been found guilty of this offence once before. He received a record £20,000 fine and was banned from running his horses for five weeks.

Yet Wigham's horses have been running anyway, under the auspices of other trainers. One of them even won a race at Kempton in Wigham's ownership. Once the 35-day ban has ended, these horses are free immediately to return to Wigham's yard.

Three things should now happen. First, the authorities must verify these horses are actually in residence at their new yards. Second, a rule must be created to prevent such horses from returning to their original trainer for three months in future cases of this kind. Third, trainers should be made to feel ashamed if they help someone who has broken the rules thumb his nose at the sport that provides him with a living.

The abortive Yarmouth boycott is a typical episode in the history of this sport: a point worth making completely lost amid some rather unpleasant in-fighting.

Nobody will remember that the paucity of runners on Monday’s fixture, abandoned due to snow, was a protest against racecourse owners Northern Racing’s woeful under-investment in prize money. They will only recall what appears to have been the high-handed bullying of small-scale trainers, who planned to run their horses, by certain big-name colleagues, who could afford not to.

Free Malt Or Mash. Sign here to release this likeable grey from a life of frustration. “He could be a good Cup horse,” says the son of Richard Hannon, the trainer, despite the horse showing its best form at far shorter distances and looking a doubtful stayer. Please help him.