Formal announcements are some weeks away, as issues of funding and branding remain outstanding. However, I understand that the causes of frustration expressed by RFC directors at the British Racing Conference last month have largely been overcome, producing a very different mood of positivity.
There was a sense, familiar to all with experience of racing politics, that factional obstacles were being erected to every proposed reform. Such intransigence was not only slowing the process but dismaying those working to develop it. Much more obstinacy and the entire RFC initiative could have been dead in the water.
Gradually, however, resistance has faded. Perhaps the most significant breakthrough occurred on the eve of Cheltenham, when RFC briefed 70 Jockey Club members and received widespread support for its plans. The Jockey Club may not officially run racing any more but it wields enormous influence. If its members are now convinced, the barriers to change will quickly come down.
Broad agreement seems imminent. I understand that the finale meeting, originally planned for late September, is now likely to be in mid-October. It will be branded as a European championships and initially staged by Ascot, for its huge spectator capacity and its stature as a destination.
This will win no favour with the French authorities, who promote their Arc meeting in early October as the climax of the European season. Gratifyingly, though, there seems to be a robust determination that British racing must finally do what is required for its own health.
Support is evidently coming from the leading racecourses, too, with agreement on the movement of some landmark races to weekends. York's Juddmonte International Stakes is likely to be one of the most notable, as the Ebor Festival shifts forward to encompass a Saturday.
The need to restructure the Flat calendar, so that peripheral sports watchers no longer regard it as virtually finished after Royal Ascot, has long been clear. If RFC achieves its targets, much humble pie should be eaten by those who derided it.
Until recently, tampering with the gem that is Cheltenham had not been considered by RFC. However, the racecourse itself offered up the possibility of a Festival Saturday and RFC will support it if - or maybe that should be when - the idea takes wing.
Suddenly, there is an appetite in the sport to modernise and adapt, to play the big events to their maximum audience and allow the rest to find their level like lower league football games. These are delicate days but there should be no turning back.
Royal Ascot Hospitality
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Corporate Hospitality Group
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