Mr Cronin said if the Gold Cup carnival was to change his preference would be later rather than earlier in the year to avoid the heat of summer.

The $180,000 Gold Cup has been a permanent fixture in late March for at least 25 years and was the richest race of its type in country NSW until Scone went to $200,000 six years ago.

The Wagga Cup, which is going to $170,000 this year, and Grafton ($160,000) are putting further pressure on Albury in the prizemoney stakes.

But Albury is finding it perennially difficult to attract higher quality runners from the large stables in Sydney and Melbourne along with leading jockeys which combined translate to all important increased betting turnover.

The Golden Slipper meeting is being held at Rosehill on Saturday and south of the border the Mornington Cup has the added bonus of a guaranteed start in this year's Caulfield Cup to the winner and the final Group 1 race of the Melbourne carnival run tonight 

"We consider it every year," Mr Cronin said of a potential date switch.

"It is always on the table and we are not absolutely entrenched.

"It has moved over the years and we're alive to that."

Racing NSW has the Albury Gold Cup carnival pencilled in for the March timeslot up until the 2020-21 racing seasons.

"Since our track has been renovated we've got more flexibility in relation to pushing it back," Mr Cronin said.

"Heat in Albury is a problem if we moved it forward.

"Historically pushing it back into mid to late autumn created the potential for difficulty to the track."

The Albury track is in peak condition following a $1.7 million upgrade completed two years ago.

The club also lost long-serving chief executive John Miller to the Sunshine Coast after he spearheaded unprecedented growth in the Gold Cup carnival.

His immediate replacement Michael Wighton had a short stint in the role before Steve Hetherton was named his successor and began in the role early in the new year.

Albury also lost its leading trainer, Brett Cavanough, to Scone in 2017, after being the dominant force in the SDRA area for more than a decade.

"It will take something to get the race from listed to Group 3," Mr Cronin said.

"I can't see that happening in the short-term.

"But we want to continue to address prizemoney because there are a heap right on our hammer at the moment."

One of the cup day features, the Albury Guineas, has taken a hit with the loss of the Inglis sponsorship.

"The loss of sponsorship has been an issue for us," Mr Cronin said.

"But we are working to try and replace that with a similar type of sponsorship."

This year's Guineas has eight entries with Sydney visitor California Concord being the standout runner.

The Gold Cup prizemoney was increased to $180,000 in 2017, but the president was guarded about when and how much the next increase would be.

"You've got to keep pace, but if you are looking at impact in relation to quality of the field, betting turnover, that sort of thing, your next prizemoney jump has to be significant," Mr Cronin said.

The club responded to stakeholder feedback in returning to a two-day carnival which kicked off yesterday with the running of the City Handicap which was taken out by track specialist Mount Horeb.

One of the most outspoken critics of the decision to split the carnival days was Canberra trainer Barb Joseph, who is back with a large team of runners including cup contender, Almost Court.

Some of the horse's owners have travelled from New Zealand to watch the six-year-old hopefully improve on its third placing in the Canberra Cup earlier this month.

But the immediate priority for the club is drawing a 10,000-plus crowd to the event on Friday.

Gold Cup day forecast is 31 degrees and humid with 70 per cent chance of 1-5mm of rain.

Outside of its core racing product, the club wants to re-establish itself as a major events venue and is in talks with Albury Council about improvements required.