Racing: Butler blends the best of many worlds

The Derby: An Irish upbringing and an American apprenticeship culminate in a serious challenge from Didcot

Epsom Downs or Churchill Downs, the preparation is the same. Meticulous, org-anised down to every exhaustive detail.

Gerard Butler approaches the Derby just as his mentor D. Wayne Lukas would have planned Thunder Gulch's triumph in the 1995 Kentucky "Dirby", when the Irishman was his assistant.

It's like having Leonardo da Vinci to instruct you in art; they simply do not come any more exalted than Lukas, who dominated American racing in the 1980s and early to mid-1990s and is still an inspirational figure. The man who began life as a basketball coach has won over $140m (£85m) in prize money. He did not achieve it by being anything but obsessive about his own horses.

Even the advancing years have not diluted that attitude. Last year, his rival Bob Baffert's War Emblem was threatening to become the first Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in 1978. As Baffert prepared for the final leg of America's greatest prize, the Belmont Stakes, having already won the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes, Lukas was asked about the fact that history might be created (it wasn't, as it transpired).

"Screw that," was the reported response of Lukas, whose Proud Citizen was also in the race. "I'm not interested in that one iota. I'll be sick if he wins. I don't want him to win at my expense."

His protégé Butler breaks into one of his engaging smiles. "That's very much Wayne. But not me. I might think it, but I wouldn't say it publicly," says the trainer after watching his Derby horse, Shield, work at the home of next Saturday's Classic. Nevertheless, the 37-year-old shares with the American an unconstrained desire for success. It is a quality which has enabled him to transform his operation from a modest 17 horses five years ago to more than 90within 2,000 idyllic acres at Blewbury, near Didcot in Oxfordshire.

Butler's novice instruction simply could not be faulted. His pedigree reads: raised on the Curragh, where his father, Tony, ran a stud farm. "He's my biggest critic. I get two or three calls a week, with advice, telling me what mistakes I've made." Influences in his career blood line: a year in Australia with a distinguished trainer, the late Colin Hayes; six months at Coolmore, Co Tipperary, Europe's pre-eminent stud; then three years with Lukas before moving to England in 1995 and joining John Dunlop for two years.

"They're the icons of the sport," he says. "It was a wonderful education. Experience is a huge requirement when you're dealing with horses. I was lucky enough to gain it from the very best. Wayne Lukas taught me a lot about how to deal with problems. He's one of the most successful men ever in the sport, an encyclopaedia of information. A fantastic man."

While Butler worked for Lukas, the American trained, amongst many, Tabasco Cat (won the Preakness and Belmont in 1994) and Thunder Gulch (won Kentucky Derby and Belmont). "It was quite an experience. He's quite a hard taskmaster, but very fair. He taught me to pay attention to detail, to strive for perfection. As a football fan, I follow Manchester United, and I like to think I run my racing establishment in the same way that they do things at Old Trafford."

Which explains his presence on Epsom Downs last week. Survey the course from the grandstand on a sun-blanched morning and, without the teeming figures of racedays, it reveals itself as a folly of the Turf. With its idiosyncratic contours, it could not be a more bizarre location for championship races.

Rather than make excuses afterwards, though, Butler has brought Shield, a grandson of the 1978 Derby victor Shirley Heights (on the dam's side), twice to Epsom to encounter the extraordinary terrain in advance of the Classic. He is partnered, as he had been 10 days previously, by Butler's young stable jockey, Eddie Ahern, who is preparing for his first Derby. "I'm not nervous yet, but I can guarantee I will be," reflects the man from Tipperary. "It's a big day for me and the horse, and for Gerard. When I get on board, Gerard's done his part, a lot of work's been done, and he doesn't want someone to f*** it up."

Ahern believes the fact that both trainer and jockey are in the relative infancy of their careers is to their benefit. "I'm glad we're both young," he says. "We're both very ambitious to get to the top and we can help each other get there." The trainer has no doubts about his jockey's potential. "Eddie's riding with such maturity, and he can only improve."

And with a certain ruthlessness? "You have to," retorts Butler. "I say to Eddie, if the gap's there, take it, and then talk about it afterwards. Just go for it. He may get the odd comment in the weighing room, but I tell him, 'Screw 'em'. We're very competitive. That doesn't mean you don't stop talking to people because you've a horse in the same race; you're not at loggerheads, nothing like that. But you do have to be very single-minded."

So, as one of the new kids on the block, with some of the best toys to play with, has he been accepted by the older fraternity? "They've had to," he says, with a laugh. "I like to think they respect me."

The old guard couldn't do anything but, confronted by a man who departed Dunlop's stables to set up as salaried trainer to a Swedish banker, Erik Penser, in 1997. "He's the landlord, but we've always been a public operation. It's gone OK. We've had our disappointments, we've had our successes, but we get our heads down and get on with the next one." That betrays false modesty: Compton Admiral won the Eclipse Stakes in 1999, and a year later Compton Bolter finished fifth in the 2,000 Guineas at 100-1, while Princess Ellen was runner-up at 66-1 in the 1,000 Guineas.

Now for the ultimate prize. "So far, so good," Butler says of his Barathea colt, who won April's Derby trial at Sandown. "We've always held him in high regard. I was really pleased with his run at Sandown and he'll justify his presence. We go there with all guns blazing."