Highview Stud stallion Align is leading the Singapore general sires’ premiership table for 2009.Progeny of the son of Night Shift have earned Sing$295,036 to date this year in Singapore with his leading performer being the Laurie Laxon-trained, Den, who has amassed stakes of Sing$79,165. He has sired six individual winners in Singapore this year – more than any other sire.
Den (NZ) (pictured below) has weighed in at every one of his five starts to date and has been successful on two occasions. The latest of these successes came in a class 4 1200m event at Kranji on March 4 in which he was ridden by leading jockey Saimee Jumaat who set him alight 200m from home and the combination went on to score by one length.Den is raced by the Oscar Stable, who is known for its penchant for naming its horses after Hollywood celebrities, but most movie buffs would be hard-pressed to name an actor or director by such a name. Laxon however explained the Align three-year-old was actually named after Oscar winner Denzel Washington (Best Actor for his turn as a rogue cop in Training Day), but had to shorten his moniker because of naming protocols. “We had a horse called Danzel before but I spelled it wrongly. When we tried to register this one as Denzel, they knocked it back because it was too close to the old one,” explained the Kiwi mentor. “So we went for Den instead, and everybody was happy.”
“He was already a good horse before he came to Singapore from New Zealand. He had a win and a second at his trials and I then paid NZ$72,500 for him at the Ready To Run Sales at Karaka,” said Laxon. “He is improving all the time and is going to develop into a very nice racehorse with the ability to go right to the top level,” Laxon said. Cherry Power (NZ) was another winner in Singapore this month who was sired by Align. He won a class 4 1100m event at Kranji on March 4.Perfect Align (NZ) was first home in a class 5 1400m event at Kranji on March 14 and at the same meeting Magic Wish (NZ) and Royal Carribean (NZ) were also both successful 1600m and 1200m events respectively.
Align has left plenty of star performers on the racetrack in recent seasons. These include two Group 1 winning two-year-olds in Nightlign and Fully Fledged as well a New Zealand Cup winner in Everswindell, and now the most exciting young sprinter in New Zealand, the Ray Coupland owned three-year-old Coup Align, a winner of six in a row including the Listed Gore Guineas.
Earlier this month the three-year-old filly Bent became the 10th individual stakes performer for Align with her third placing in the Listed Otago Racing Club Breeders’ Stakes (1400m) at Wingatui. She has also been a winner on two occasions this year.
Buyers looking for an opportunity to purchase Align's progeny will be able to do so at the upcoming deplenishing sale being held at Highview Stud on Sunday, March 29.
Align is represented by one weanling filly in the Highview Sale, while 10 mares will be sold in-foal to the Group 1 AJC Produce Stakes winning stallion at the same sale.
