Carl Jamieson has decades of experience preparing horses for the Ontario Sires Stakes post season, and the trainer says three-year-old pacing filly Noone To Depend On is in peak form heading into Friday’s Grassroots Semi-Final at Mohawk Racetrack.

“She should be shaping up real good,” said Jamieson. “She’s ready to rock and roll.”

Noone To Depend On scored three wins and one third in her four regular season Grassroots outings for a division-leading 162 points and has a sophomore record of four wins, two seconds and one third in 14 starts. The daughter of Santanna Blue Chip and Tipsy Taters has added $49,810 in earnings to the $48,480 she earned as a two-year-old, when she finished second in her Semi-Final and fourth in the Grassroots Championship.

“I think she’s a lot better than she was last year,” noted Jamieson. “She had some growing problems last year and this year she’s been sound all year and racing really good.”

The Rockwood resident shares ownership of Noone To Depend On with his daughter, Brandy Jamieson, who makes her home in Milton, Ont. A one-quarter share in the filly was Brandy’s birthday gift last year, an annual tradition Jamieson admits comes packaged with an ulterior motive.

“I usually give her a piece for her birthday. Means I don’t got to pay no paddock fees on them then,” said Jamieson with a chuckle. “She usually paddocks her own horses.”

Making it a full-on family affair, Moffat, Ont. resident Jody Jamieson drives the filly for his father and sister and will steer Noone To Depend on from Post 6 in Friday’s $20,000 semi-final. She heads into the test off a mini-vacation following her win in the August 21 Grassroots event at Rideau Carleton Raceway.

“I told him, you’ve got to take this filly, she’s on the top of her game,” said Jamieson, who has had to find substitute reinsmen in seven of the filly’s 14 starts. “We’ve been keeping her pretty fresh all year really. We didn’t race her a lot, just trying to keep her right and sound for the Grassroots final.”

Once the Grassroots post season wraps up Jamieson will give Noone To Depend On one start against the Gold Series fillies, on September 30 at Mohawk Racetrack, before sending her to Harrisburg for the November mixed sale. The horseman typically sells his three-year-olds to make room for yearlings, although he has scaled back from the days when he would send out 20 to 30 starters per year in the Ontario Sires Stakes program.

“We only had eight babies all last year, to start with. We qualified six, one we stopped with, and then a couple others I made the decision we had to turn out, they weren’t good enough,” noted the trainer, who added that he will start shopping for this season’s yearlings at the Sunday, Sept. 18 Canadian Yearling Sale.

Noone To Depend On goes postward in the second three-year-old pacing filly semi-final on Friday, slated as Race 4. The top five finishers from each semi-final will return to Mohawk on Saturday, September 24 for their $50,000 Grassroots Championship.

The three-year-old trotting fillies will kick off the sophomore Grassroots Semi-final battles at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, competing in Races 1 and 6. The trotting colts wage their battles in Races 2 and 8, while the pacing fillies go back-to-back in Races 3 and 4. The three-year-old pacing colts wrap things up in Races 9 and 12.

Friday’s event completes the semi-final round — the two-year-old finalists will be determined on Thursday evening — which advances the top five finishers from each semi-final into the $400,000 Grassroots Championship Night at Mohawk on September 24.

To view the harness racing entries for Friday at Mohawk, click the following link: Friday Entries – Mohawk Racetrack.

(OSS)