Ben Ropiha is upbeat about the chances of his in-form stayer Doiknowyou at Hawera on Saturday.
The Cambridge trainer believes the seven-year-old can repeat his last-start Rating 75 company victory in the Kaponga Hotel Egmont Cup.
While Doiknowyou has only won three races, he has already placed in an open handicap on the course having finished runner-up there to Our Gazza during the winter.
“He’s more seasoned now and his feet are as good as they’ve ever been,” Ropiha said, giving credit to his farrier brother Logan.“We’ve always had a lot of trouble with them and that’s why he’s relatively lightly-raced, but Logan has done an outstanding job and that’s why the horse has kicked on and found winning form.”
Ropiha said he had Doiknowyou aimed at the Egmont Cup for some time.“I was looking through the programmes a while ago and after he ran third at Auckland I thought if he could win his next start then we would go down for it.
“He won pretty decisively last time and he would probably have been competitive in the Mitchelson Cup that same day.”Doiknowyou costed home by six and a half lengths to book his passage south and he will be ridden by Michael McNab, who has won on the son of Kashani before.
