Racing authorities are only very occasionally faced with decisions that affect those who do not attend race-meetings.
The vast majority of the time, they strive to improve the racing experience for those they persuade to leave the comfort and convenience of their homes to travel the required distance, find the venue, handle car parking issues or those inherent with public transport, pay for admission and view the racing from a distance with limited information.
Much of their management attention will be focused on how best to keep the customer entertained and amused between the relatively brief periods of sporting activity.
The sales proposition is that by seeing the sport 'live', racegoers become infected by the atmosphere and thrill to the first-hand experience of 'being-there'.
By the time they get home, having calculated the cost or profit on the day, those who attended will catch up on the news and reviews, most likely watching recordings of the day's sport.
From the outset of televised racing, way back in the late 1950s, views have been expressed on where the balance ideally lies between showing sufficient coverage of racing on television to interest the public, encouraging them to participate by attending and betting, and not showing so much that there is really no incentive for them to leave their living rooms.
Taken to an extreme, by maximising revenue streams from television contracts and through the gaming economy, it is now possible for some parts of the sport to thrive with virtually nobody in attendance.
For all-weather courses, gate receipts pale into insignificance compared with earnings from satellite television and, most importantly the contract for putting pictures into betting shops.
During the recent eight-day sequence of fixtures at Lingfield, 17 people paid for entry on one day.
'Crowds' there and at the likes of Kempton and Southwell are frequently fewer than 100.
They are all, very much, going concerns and would like to race even more frequently.
Cheltenham sits at the other end of the sport's spectrum. Of the annual turnover approaching £30 million, a very small proportion directly comes from broadcast television, satellite or the supply of pictures to betting shops.
Many of us caught our first glimpse of racing at Cheltenham on television.
For me, it was in the 1960s when BBC Grandstand gave my family access to a wide range of sport from rugby internationals to motorcar hill climbs at a curious place called 'Rest and be Thankful'. Horseracing was the perfect length and shape for Grandstand, providing four 15-minute sessions that interlaced other activities.
What I remember is not a stirring, heart-stopping finish but the calm and anticipation of horses walking round at the two-and-a-half-mile start.
'The Voice', Peter O'Sullevan would then, quietly, let you know who was who, occasionally breaking the natural sounds of horses galloping and brushing over fences or hurdles. I was captivated.
I was immediately faced with the dilemma of taking my new passion no further and just relying on television coverage or making all that effort to travel to Cheltenham, to see it for myself but without 'The Voice' and those wonderful images.
Twenty-five years later, I was at the very centre of another dilemma.
BBC and Cheltenham had enjoyed a massively successful partnership over 40 years.
The coverage was iconic but times were changing.
New kid on the block Channel 4 had made an audacious bid three years earlier that Racecourse Holdings Trust, owners of Cheltenham, had not taken seriously and that resonated with Channel 4's chief Michael Grade.
For this round of negotiation, Grade made a personal appearance and left everyone in the room with no doubt of his appetite to give racing a leading role in their output and to approach it with energy and innovation that the incumbent, BBC, could not match.
We were faced with either taking the comfortable route of 'same again' BBC or using this opportunity to articulate how we hoped Cheltenham could be seen, relating to a whole new generation of audience.
To make the decision harder, there was not a great difference in the financial offers. We were looking at decision based on culture and personalities.
The battle lines were drawn up around the stations' stars – those who despaired of us even considering departing from Peter O'Sullevan and those expressing high anxiety that we should open our doors to that 'dreadful' John McCririck.
To make the negotiations a little more difficult, BBC Outside Broadcasts were experiencing industrial action, protracting the process.
The lobby of a hotel in Oxford became our regular meeting place with the different parties.
When the phone rang at 4.10 one Friday and my contact at BBC told me an announcement was being sent out at 5pm, saying Cheltenham had walked away from a partnership that stretched back 40 years, my heart took a couple of extra beats.
The final offer to Channel 4 had not quite been accepted. Thirty minutes and a couple of calls later, the deal was sealed and Cheltenham was looking ahead to a new era.
There was concern that if the TV coverage became too brilliant, there would be greater temptation for would-be customers to stay at home.
However, as our relationship with Channel 4 developed, attendances grew.
We experimented with allowing more than four races to be broadcast from the Festival and the upward trend continued. In turn, that attracted more sponsors.
Our relationship with BBC was not lost entirely. Through Radio Five Live, Radio Gloucestershire and other local stations following their heroes to the Festival, the event build-up is wider than ever before.
The radio audience for the big Festival races is larger than the TV audience and talk of Clare Balding making her debut in the coverage next year is uninformed. Clare has been a key player on the radio coverage for many years.
Contrastsd between the media coverage over three decades are stark.
As the Festival has got longer, it has also got bigger. New media has given the racecourse, owners, trainers, riders and support teams a whole new dimension.
Over 800 press are accredited each March.
There is demand for better access behind the scenes, which needs to be protected in the interests of integrity; live coverage is now multi-channel; Cheltenham Radio allows racegoers to be as well informed as those at home.
Big screens are being supplemented by personal small screens.
The Racecourse must keep up with the pace of development or the experience for those attending will slip back behind that of those who follow from afar.
Cheltenham is a phenomenally picturesque sporting venue.
A friendly voice in our ear, describing the scene and explaining the action is a vital ingredient.
As many a TV producer has reminded me, 'It's not rocket science. All we need do is point the cameras in the right direction and add a little magic.'
I wish the new production team who take over next year every success.
Losing Alastair Down from their line-up will deprive the team of the natural successor to Sir Peter and John Oaksey as the voice of Cheltenham but no doubt a new one will emerge.