All eyes were on Lady Rainbow in Tuesday’s lone division of the Simcoe Stakes, but a costly break on the way to the backstretch by that heavily-favoured three-year-old filly left the door wide-open for an upset in the $204,626 affair
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Southwind Amiga was the one who stepped up and filled the role of upsetter for the duo of driver Jody Jamieson and trainer Trond Smedshammer. Sent off at odds of 9-1, the daughter of Chocolatier-Southwind Agnes attacked first-over and staved off the hard-closing Lady Rainbow in the rich tilt.
Oh Sweet Baby (Mario Baillargeon) shot to the top and supplied the field with a :28-second opening panel, but Firstclassprincess (Jack Moiseyev) brushed to the top in the backstretch and had the field at her mercy past the mid-way point in :57.3. Jamieson angled Southwind Amiga, who was sitting fourth, off the rail going into the final turn, and they proceeded to inch closer to Firstclassprincess at the three-quarter pole in 1:27.3. The leader had little to offer when asked to sprint, but that wasn’t the case for Southwind Amiga. She unleashed a :27.3 closing panel to win by just a half-length margin over Lady Rainbow in 1:55.1. Third prize went to Eagle Canada.
“She’s a professional,” said Jamieson following the win. “She doesn’t show a lot of breaks, but the connections told me not to look down. She’s doing some funny stuff trotting and she’s not your typical one, two, three, four gaited trotter. At the half, I looked back and Rick [Zeron with Lady Rainbow] was about five lengths off and I didn’t know why until I found out after the race that she made a break. That was to our advantage. I thought my filly was good enough to be in the top three. I spoke to Trond [trainer Trond Smedshammer] today and he said that he thought we had a good shot to be in the top three and he was right.”
David Anderson of Aurora, ON owns the filly, who was a $180,000 purchase from the 2009 Lexington Select Yearling Sale. She went winless in three starts as a rookie, but she has put together a 2-2-2 record from eight starts in this year’s sophomore campaign. Tuesday’s victory helped her lifetime earnings swell to $131,503.
(With quotes from WEG)
To view results for Tuesday's card of harness racing, click the following link: Tuesday Results – Mohawk Racetrack.
The early break certainly
The early break certainly didn't help,"Lady Rainbow', but the,"key", to, "Southwind Amiga's", win, was the third quarter. It was extremely,"slow". That enabled Jody Jamieson to steer,"Southwind Amiga", into favorable postioning without ,"using". Moves made against ,"slow", fractions being untaxing. Jamieson was then able to unleash a very,"fast", final fraction that ,"Lady Rainbow", was unable to conquer.