Leading South Island trainer Michael Pitman has Group 1 ambitions for exciting sprinter Coup Align next season.
Pitman is eyeing up a tilt for the promising son of Align at the time-honoured Group 1 Telegraph Handicap (1200m) at Trentham next January.
“He is an ideal horse for a race like the Telegraph,” Pitman says. “He has explosive early speed and is right up to the best sprinters in the land.”
“David Walsh (jockey) has told me that he rates him (Coup Align) right up there with the best sprinters he has ridden during his long career and that includes Courier Bay and Tanalyse.”
“His turn of foot is exceptional and we have not seen the best of him yet.”
This season Coup Align made his mark in the three-year-old sprinting ranks.
Coup Align won six races in succession this season culminating in black-type success in the Listed Gore Guineas (1355m) on January 17. He trounced his rivals at Gore winning by two and a half lengths and was untested.
“He spelled well and looks a million dollars as he starts a new campaign,” Pitman said.
Another race which is likely to be on Coup Align’s summer programme is the Group 3 Stewards Handicap (1200m) at the New Zealand Cup meeting in November.
