Pletcher barn is upbeat about Life Talk, Tizzy in the Sky

Life Talk was awarded a career-high 84 Beyer Speed Figure by Daily Racing Form for her pace-setting triumph in Saturday’s Grade 2, $250,000 Demoiselle, a 1 1/8-mile test for juvenile fillies at Aqueduct.

The Kentucky Oaks (G1), for which she earned 10 qualifying points with the Demoiselle victory, is the long-term target for Life Talk, her Hall of Fame trainer Todd Pletcher told DRF.

Click here for Aqueduct entries and results.

Owned by Mike Repole, the daughter of Gun Runner rebounded strongly from a game, fourth-place effort in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies in November, when she stalked the pace and brushed with a foe before coming up 3 1/2 lengths shy of the victorious Just F Y I.

In the Demoiselle, she broke sharply over a muddy, sealed, main track and dictated terms at each point of call, drawing off with ease down the stretch to post the 3 3/4-length victory at a final time of 1:51.10.

“She’s good this morning. Perky. She cleaned up last night,” Amelia Green, Pletcher’s Belmont Park-based assistant, said Sunday. “She was already mentally very smart even before this race.”

For her victory Life Talk earned the maximum allotment of the 10-5-3-2-1 Kentucky Oaks (G1) qualifying points available to the top-five finishers. In addition to the Demoiselle, the $335,000 Keeneland September yearling-sale purchase earned another three points when she finished third in the Frizette (G1) and six points for her Breeders’ Cup effort. She is out of the winning Bernardini mare Touchy Feely, a half-sister to Grade 2 winner Indian Firewater.

One race after Life Talk took the Demoiselle, the Pletcher team watched KimDon Racing’s Tizzy in the Sky put in a game performance to be second to Dr B in the Go for Wand (G3), a one-turn mile for fillies and mares, 3 years old and up.

The daughter of Sky Kingdom gave chase behind the pace set by Dr B and made up ground late but could not reel in her foe and was defeated 3 3/4 lengths. That effort came on the heels of a close second to Interstatedaydream in the 1 1/8-mile Turnbackthealarm on Nov. 3 at Aqueduct.

“It wasn’t quite her distance yesterday, and they went fast early, but she closed nicely for second,” Green said. “She came back good this morning.”

Green added that Pletcher’s other two stakes contenders on the card, Moonlight and Private Desire, each returned well from their efforts after finishing fourth and 10th, respectively, in the $250,000 Remsen (G2).