The Riccarton trainer was assured of the title yesterday when Mark Walker scratched Electrify and Shacuse at the Waipa meeting tomorrow.
Walker, who operates stables at Matamata and Rangiora, has De Lago Dancer remaining at the Waipa meeting.
He has no horses entered for the Hawkes Bay meeting on Thursday, the final for the season.
A stable representative said De Lago Dancer would not start.
The withdrawals are in view of a very heavy track at Te Awamutu.
Pitman has won 86 races this season, two more than Walker, who topped the premiership last season with 83 wins.
Pitman reached the lead in the premiership when he won three races at Oamaru on Sunday.
His total is the highest for a South Island trainer, eclipsing his 74-win total last season when he finished third to Walker and Stephen McKee.
The last South Island trainer to top the premiership was Gore-based Rex Cochrane with 53 wins in the 1971-72 season.
The last Canterbury trainer was Frank Trilford, of Washdyke, in 1953-54 with 36 wins and the last Riccarton trainer was Jack Shaw with 36 in 1949-50.
The premiership win is a career highlight for Pitman, who has been training for 29 years.
He won his first race with Ben Ahee at Hokitika in 1979.
He has won 1013 races, including 296 in partnership.
He trained for a time with his wife, Diane, who continues to make a major contribution to the stable operation.
He also had Chris Harris as a training partner.
The Pitman stable horses have travelled extensively in the South Island for 655 starts this season and stake earnings of $1,521,754, a record for a South Island trainer.
The major win for the season was the $270,000 group two Coupland's Bakeries Mile at Riccarton in November with Final Reality.
The Pitman-trained Benelli was runner-up.
The stable produced Coup Bloomsbury to dead-heat with O'Cartier in the gr three $75,000 Stewards' Handicap the same day.
The Pitman-trained Borninthestates won six races, including the Dunedin, Riverton, Waikouaiti and Greymouth Cups and Kumara Nuggets.
Coup Bloomsbury was ridden by David Walsh, the Palmerston North jockey, who rode some 40 winners for the stable during the season.
Ashlee Mundy, who completed her apprenticeship with the stable three weeks ago, also made a worthwhile contribution.
She was the leading South Island apprentice with 50 wins.
Pitman will now focus on the Grand National meeting.
He has Square Pants, Peyow Peyow and Benelli entered for the $125,000 Winter Cup on Saturday.
Our Genes, winner of his last three starts, has been set for a $35,000 race on the last day.
• Robert Thompson set an Australian riding record of 3323 wins when he won on Promised at Port Macquarie yesterday, AAP reports.
The feat came a day after Thompson (50) rode a winner at Scone to equal the record of Jack Thompson.
The latter rode between 1938-85, winning his last race aged 62.
His tally included 41 group one wins.
• Jockeys Reese Jones and Vinny Colgan have each been suspended for one month and fined $1125 for failing an breath-alcohol test at the Ruakaka race meeting a fortnight ago.
Racecourse inspector John McKenzie said Colgan and Jones were "substantially over" the 100mcg of alcohol per litre of breath when tested on the Saturday morning of the meeting.
Both were stood down from riding.
The 100mcg level for riders is considerably less than the 400mcg limit set for car drivers.
