His renowned fitness enabled him to dispose of Otago's top two players in Ashburton last weekend.
With three of the province's top men absent, due to injuries or exam commitments, he is well placed in a compressed schedule that includes four singles and three doubles in two days.
Kingi has been playing in Germany in the New Zealand winter and he has also brought with him several of the young charges that he mentors in a culmination of a series of junior tournaments.
Other top four seeds include Ben Johnston (Canterbury), Aaron Hicks (Auckland) and Durdamya Munibhargav (Auckland). However it is the next group of seeds which holds high local interest and many have had plenty of hard match play recently.
Daiki Naka (Canterbury), won the Otago junior tournament, which ended yesterday. Jong Kyu Kim beat Naka in Ashburton and in Christchurch, but is seeded seventh to Naka's fifth, because he has lower points on national rankings.
Splitting them is Paddy Ou, who also has had close matches with those players, and all are match-hardened and dangerous floaters. The final seeding goes to Ryan Eggers, who just edges out another promising junior in Carlos Reid. A number of leading women are battling injuries, or have avoided this event, and this has opened up the chance for a new winner.
Jessie Stevenson, who has lived in the shadows of Sian and Hanna English or Georgia Hume, has a good chance to claim a title on the back of recent strong form.
Opposition could come from the North Otago pair Nicky Wallace and Rebecca Dellaway, who both play in the Dunedin club competition, or the experienced Dunedin players Debby Stevens and Heike Cebulla-Elder. Play begins in the Edgar Centre from 10am today and finals are scheduled from late Sunday morning.
