“He just looked like a horse that was gonna mature,” trainer Keri Brion says of the decision to purchase St James the Great. “Great bone. Really big but not too big, just a really good-looking horse in general, and we just thought as he got older, he would probably get better.”

Brion, along with owners Serio Racing Stables and USA Steeplechase, will get a fresh gauge on how the maturation process is coming Saturday when the son of Catholic Boy tries his luck in the $150,000 Kent Stakes at Delaware Park.

The Kent is carded as the eighth of 10 races on a card topped by the Grade 3 Delaware Oaks. The Kent, a 1 3/8 mile turf test, has attracted a field of 11 sophomores.

The owners went to $67,000 to purchase St James the Great from the May 2023 Fasig-Tipton Midlantic two-year-old sale in Timonium. That was a bit more than they’d hoped.

“He was just one of those horses where you’re like, you want this one,” Brion says with a laugh. “We splurged a little bit on him, but, you know, he’s a nice horse.”

St James the Great ran well enough in his first start though it was going short on the Colonial lawn – “just to get a run in him,” says his trainer – behind two next-out winners. That established a pattern that’s dogged him throughout his career: if there’s a good turf horse around, he pretty much always shows up against St James the Great.

He’s seen Fulmineo twice, and that runner is a stakes winner and Grade 2-placed. He ran second to Neat in his third start, and that runner is now a multiple Grade 3 winner.

And of course last time out in the Grade 2 Pennine Ridge – a race where you expect to catch some tough rivals – he ran against the English-bred Legend of Time, who was clearly prepping for bigger races. Legend of Time is the 5-2 second choice on the morning line in Saturday’s Grade 1 Belmont Derby Invitational.

“He has faced tough company every step of the way, really,” Brion agrees. “But he’s there and he shows up every time.”

In the Pennine Ridge, St James the Great was never far off the pace and moved to virtually even terms at the head of the lane. But he couldn’t quite quicken and finished fifth, beaten just 3 ½ lengths.

“He just wouldn’t settle,” Brion says of his performance that day. “He was just always in the bridle a little bit too much for Javy [jockey Javier Castellano].”

To attempt to rectify that problem, Brion will remove the blinkers for Saturday’s contest. He ran his first two races without blinkers but has had them on for his last four, including his only win. In all, St James the Great has a win and just over $55,000 in earnings from six career starts.

Brion will also leg up a new jockey. Sheldon Russell will be in the irons for the first time.

“I think Sheldon will really suit him,” Brion explains. “I think Sheldon is really good at getting them to relax, and I think that’s what this horse needs in order to get the mile-and-three. If he can relax early, I think he’ll stay and finish.”

Brion trains both flat horses and jumpers, and she says that St James the Great has been out on some two-mile gallops with her jumpers. So she’s convinced that if her charge can relax and find a good rhythm, the distance should suit.

Indeed, the distance is a question for most of these; so, too, is their quality. There’s a maiden here, and most of the rest of the field has just a single win. Some of them look like they may go on to do nice things, but as of this moment, there’s only a single stakes win in the group.

That belongs to Spirit Prince, who is 9-2 on the morning line and likely will go off as the favorite. He won the Central Park at Aqueduct in November after having placed in two previous stakes. The Central Park win was Spirit Prince’s first and thus far only score in six career outings, though he’s never finished worse than third.

Spirit Prince is trained by Christophe Clement for Oakwood Stables, Scott Krase, Donarra Thoroughbreds, Kenneth Beitz, and Gail Beitz. Jose Ortiz will ride.

The 7-2 morning line favorite is Triple Espresso, trained by Todd Pletcher for Repole Stable and St. Elias Stables. A winner once in seven starts, he most recently was sixth in the Pennine Ridge, finishing three parts of a length behind St James the Great. Javier Castellano will ride.

“I think basically all the horses have a chance,” Brion says. “I think you could make a case for almost every horse in the race. They’re all pretty even, and we’ll see what happens.”

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