ST Jean won his first stakes race on New Year’s Day when he landed a thrilling victory in the Group 3 City Of Auckland Cup at Ellerslie in New Zealand. In so doing he became the 62nd stakes winner for his sire Teofilo, one of the array of stallions on show this Saturday at Kildangan Stud where he will stand this season at €40,000.

The seven-year-old full horse St Jean is out of the Marju mare Oriental Fashion and he started his racing career in Ireland. Owned and bred by Hadi Al Tajir at Derrinstown Stud, St Jean was initially in training with Kevin Prendergast and finished last on his only outing as a juvenile at Dundalk in November 2012.

A well-beaten third on his seasonal debut at three to Ruler Of The World, winner of the Epsom Derby two months later, St Jean travelled to Tramore for his next start – ironically on the same day as the Epsom Derby – and ran out a 16-length winner of a mile and a half maiden just hours before the classic. Four subsequent outings in Ireland produced a couple of placed efforts before he was sold to continue his racing career down under.

He moved first to Australia where he was successful four times for trainer Aaron Purcell. He was being aimed at the Caulfield and Melbourne Cups in 2014 before he was side lined for more than two years with a tendon injury. The owners then contacted his current trainers Donna Logan and Chris Gibbs and now he is line for a NZ$1 million bonus if he can add February’s Avondale Cup and March’s Auckland Cup to his roll of honour.

This victory came on just his third start back after the layoff and the 65,000gns Tattersalls Horses In Training Sale graduate could still have improvement in him, despite his years.

Last November at Goffs Hadi Al Tajir entered a winning half-sister to St Jean, in foal to Night Of Thunder, but she did not take up her appointment with the auctioneers.

A half-sister to seven winners, she now has the added attraction of being a half-sister to a group winner. Until now the best of her siblings had been the group-placed trio of Famous Warrior (by Alhaarth), Green Coast (by Green Desert) and Bulbul, a daughter of Shamardal.

Oriental Fashion, the Marju dam of St Jean, was bred by Shadwell Estate, raced for Godolphin and was trained by Saeed bin Suroor. She won the Group 2 Premio Ribot in Italy, a listed race in France and was stakes-placed in England. She was one of a pair of stakes winners from the Mr Prospector mare Wijdan, the other being the Danehill filly Makderah who won the Grade 2 New York Stakes in the USA where she was placed in the Grade 1 Diana Stakes.

Wijdan was out of the Bustino mare Height Of Fashion, bred by Queen Elizabeth and raced initially in her silks. Unbeaten at two and the joint top-rated juvenile filly in Europe, she was a record-breaking winner at three of the Princess Of Wales’s Stakes and then sold for a reputed £1.5 million to Hamdan Al Maktoum.

At stud she was enormously successful and her offspring included group winners Alwasmi (John Porter Stakes), Unfuwain (Princess Of Wales’s Stakes, 2nd King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes), Nashwan (2000 Guineas, Epsom Derby, Eclipse Stakes) and Nayef (Champion Stakes, Juddmonte International, Dubai Sheema Classic and Prince of Wales’s Stakes).