On Friday afternoon I took some time out to watch one of the year's big racing events - the Gold Cup at Cheltenham.

It was an exciting race which saw the contenders battle with one another to get into pole position and win the race. In the end Synchronised won a hard fought race.

This is a great way of describing where we have got to with the market testing of bidders for the sale of BBC Television Centre (TVC). We are down to a small pack of keen contestants all of whom are vying for the winning position!

We're now approaching the final furlongs and the winning post is in sight - it will be interesting to see which bidder makes it across the winning line.

Monday’s FT reported on the progress the BBC is making in driving out greater cost savings from the property portfolio.

The new look Broadcasting House which is now receiving its first round of occupiers will be fully operational by March 2013.

By taking advantage of the re-designed phase 2, and by closing other BBC buildings, estimated costs savings over the coming 20 years will be £736m.

Now that’s not a bad result.

As we near the finishing line of the market testing process, here are some facts around the huge amount of interest the sale of this iconic building has provoked;-

We set up a special website to ensure that we spread the word about the sale of TVC far and wide and some 28,483 people visited it!

234 organisations registered an interest in the sale.

We received 34 formal expressions of interest of whom a considerable number chose to submit formal bids.

We’ve been working with a much smaller group over the past few weeks to clarify their offers and we expect to close out the process in the near future.

Watch this space!