William Backer's Pillow Talk, who ran seventh in the tough Lake George (gr. III) at Saratoga on July 29, will get another shot at facing stakes company when she meets twelve other 3-year-old fillies in the competitive $100,000 Christiana Stakes at Delaware Park on Saturday.
The daughter of Lear Fan is trained by H. Graham Motion The 1 1/8-mile turf contest. Since her start in the Lake George, Pillow Talk rebounded to win a 1 1/16-mile Delaware Park turf allowance on Aug. 31.
The Maryland-bred has a career record of three wins and two thirds from six starts with earnings of $81,810.
Motion has also entered Alternate, but he will likely run Pillow Talk and scratch Alternate, the morning line favorite at 4-1. That would leave Ntombi and Maliziosa Haras to duel as the possible public choice. Maliziosa Haras is the co-high weight at 122 pounds, along with Pass the Virtue and Infinite.
"I plan to run Pillow Talk if the race stays on the grass," said Motion. "It is unlikely that I would run Alternate. If it came off the grass I would probably not run Pillow Talk and could run Alternate."
Motion had been thinking of giving Pillow Talk another shot at stake before.
"I think she is a pretty hard knocking filly. We ran her in the Lake George, which came up very competitive I thought, but she seems to have bounced back out of that race. She kind of got boxed in a little bit on the rail, and I thought her effort was pretty good considering it was quite an ambitious step at the time."
$100,000 Christiana Stakes (3-year-old fillies, 1 1/8 mile on turf)PP Horse (Jockey) Wgt., ML Odds
1 Pass the Virtue (A Delgado), 122, 20-1
2 Affirmed Dancer (Chris DeCarlo), 115, 8-1
3 Garden Dance Debra (Clinton Potts), 117, 15-1
4 Alternate (Mike McCarthy), 119, 4-1
5 Ntombi (No Rider), 117, 5-1
6 Maliziosa Haras (J. Pimentel), 122, 5-1
7 Four Pennies (Eibar Coa), 115, 8-1
8 Pillow Talk (Mike McCarthy), 117, 8-1
9 Infinite (Anthony Black), 122, 10-1
10 Katzen (Oliver Castillo), 117, 12-1
11 Weepnomoremylady (Carlos Cruz), 117, 12-1
12 Sally's Forum (Carlos Cruz), 117, 15-1
13 Long Chun Bone (R Torres), 115, 30-1
