As the title suggests, I'd be grateful for some ideas to fly from nyc to CPT in 6.5 months, We've secured reward tickets on DL and virgin flying back from jnb but the only availability on the way there through DL is business to London, long layover in london, then business to Amsterdam then economy on klm (x fare) to CPT. I don't know if we can pay to upgrade the x fare with cash.

We have Amex miles, spg miles and a delta Amex to hit some spending bonuses on.

Am I too late? Will seats be released?

Edited to add that in full disclosure I made the same routing request in the other alliance forums as we have miles and status and transfer abilities in each. Each post separately references any status with a participating alliance airline and any specific miles we have with each participant. If this is in violation of any multiple posting rules because it is three separate requests for the same trip, my apologies, and understand it it will be deleted. We usually just buy the tickets outright so aside from one foray into upgrading with miles, this is really my first time booking award tickets and I usually post in the luxury hotels section.

Many thanks!