The calendar may disagree but, to the majority of sports followers who engage with racing only on its biggest days, the Flat season starts on Saturday. First weekend of May, summer in the offing and classics to be run. The Guineas turns otherwise reluctant heads, which is why its storylines must resonate with the wider world.

Like it or not, the public at large is not greatly moved by cerebral debates over pedigree, conformation or stamina. Most find such matters about as interesting as Formula One petrolheads arguing the toss over intricate engine design, or cricket anoraks discussing the relative merits of bowlers' economy rates.

All have their place among the cognoscenti of each sport but are equally hopeless as selling points. A sport needs two things to be truly popular - it must be easily understood and it must have accessible personalities.

Sometimes, flat racing, with its insular ways, seems bent on depriving us of both.

A year ago, the 2,000 Guineas victory of Cockney Rebel was a scriptwriter's gift. The name itself was a winner, let alone the euphoric small-time owner and an entourage that included the original Cockney Rebel himself, Steve Harley. But you can't produce such outcomes to order.

Newmarket on Saturday will suffer from the absence of Twice Over and his trainer Henry Cecil, one of the few endearingly recognisable faces of his profession. A Guineas victory for Cecil would have projected the sport into the nation's living rooms. Ah well, there's still the Derby.

Only one favourite has won the 2,000 Guineas in the last 14 years and New Approach has even more than statistics to overcome if he is to be a popular winner. Jim Bolger, his Irish trainer, has spent a decorated career avoiding being a personality and has now alienated himself still further by disdaining the Derby.

Aidan O'Brien is a standing dish at the Guineas, shuttling from one box to another to saddle his plethora of runners. The bespectacled magician made an unusually sluggish start to the campaign but the victories of Duke of Marmalade and Yeats on Sunday will put Ballydoyle in better heart.

No Kieren Fallon this year (though the man has no intention of going away and was spotted at Sandown on Saturday) and Johnny Murtagh will have first pick of O'Brien's four. Quite how Coolmore's custom of literary and lyrical naming has collapsed in the case of Plan is a mystery that requires explanation.

Other possible winners in the personality stakes are the articulate John Gosden, the emotional Peter Chapple-Hyam and the venerable Geoff Wragg, who would not say much in victory but, at 78, would still be quite some story.

Perhaps, though, the safe bet for getting the first classic a high profile is through the boys in blue. Godolphin have not won this race since 1996 and have spent much of the past two English summers defending themselves against charges of underachievement.

This time, they are marching in from Dubai with Ibn Khaldun. Racing needs Godolphin to start winning classics again and revive its challenge to Ballydoyle. And one guaranteed way of getting a TV news slot on Saturday night is through a Dettori dismount.

Flying in the face of gloomy financial forecasts, racing is celebrating a remarkable rise in prize-money. For the second half of this year, an extra £6.7 million will be pumped into the prize fund by the Levy Board and next year's figure looks set to break all records, facilitating many of the fixture list reforms recommended by the British Horseracing Authority.

That this has happened without fanfare or explanation may be of little concern to all those who stand to benefit but it still raises uncomfortable questions about the influence of bookmakers' forecasts and the operational customs of the Levy Board.

The bookmakers' official prediction of this year's Levy was £85.5 million and it now looks likely to exceed £120 million. Well, what's £35 million between friends? The fact is, though, that this wildly inaccurate forecast has penalised racing in planning and goodwill terms.

And what of the Levy Board, who now seem unable to explain how the extra money has been generated or whether it can be counted upon in the future. Surely this independent body, clinging to existence through the reluctant extension of an archaic system of handouts, must be more accountable than that?

Is Mike de Kock the best trainer in the world? Even a couple of years ago, the suggestion would have been laughable but, since then, this maverick South African has travelled and plundered remorselessly.

He won almost £3 million on Dubai World Cup night and on Saturday evening, in Hong Kong, he landed the Queen Elizabeth II Cup with Archipenko, a colt that had become so disappointing in Ireland that Coolmore sold him on.

De Kock trains upwards of 150 horses in Johannesburg but he is now finalising resources for his biggest raid yet on Britain. Sun Classique, already favourite for the King George at Ascot, will head up his team.

Unlike many in this country, De Kock, 44, thinks the racing world is there to be conquered. As he has one big personality to go with it, this man could light up the British summer.