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Akuta to miss the SENTrack A.G Hunter Cup

New Zealand’s best pacer Akuta is out of the Hunter Cup and his racing future in doubt after a training mishap.

Gutted trainer Mark Purdon said he feared Akuta had sustained “quite a serious” tendon injury.

“He pulled a shoe in training on Wednesday. It came off and went back on the tendon,” he said.

“There’s quite a bit of swelling, it could be quite serious.

“When you’ve got that much swelling, they can’t really do a scan. They’ll need it to go down a bit and say it could be a couple of weeks to get the full picture.

“It’s such a blow. He was days away from going to Melbourne and there’s other big races just around the corner.”

Those other races include the $1mil Miracle Mile and $NZ1mil Race by Grins.

Akuta was booked on a flight next Wednesday from Auckland to Melbourne to tackle the $450,000 Hunter Cup at Melton on February 3.

Purdon confirmed he would still make the trip with stable young gun Don’t Stop Dreaming.

“We’re down to one … he’ll still go and we’ll change plans now with him,” he said.

“With no Akuta, we will run Don’t Stop Dreaming in the Hunter Cup. He’ll run in the Casey Classic on Saturday week and then the Hunter Cup a week later.

“We’ll then take him to Sydney for the one of the lead-up races to try and get his spot in the Chariots Of Fire.”

Akuta is Purdon’s latest stable star and was just starting out what shapes as a stellar open class career.

His 31 starts have netted 16 wins, 10 placings and over $1.1mil in prize money.

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