Where there’s a will . . .
Robin Oakley
Observing a short-eared owl beating over the marshes like a huge, predatory moth, an osprey finishing off the fish meal he had snatched a few minutes before from Loch Don, an otter carrying home his supper across a rippling inlet were highlights of a few days on the Isle of Mull this week. But the most illuminating moment was watching a kestrel twisting and diving in aerial combat with a buzzard.
The buzzard was three times his size but it was the smaller raptor who performed the aerobatic equivalent of kicking sand in the big fella’s face. Finally the buzzard flapped off with weary wingbeats as if to say, ‘OK, OK, if this patch matters that much to you ... ’ In taking on the big boys confidence is crucial, and on a visit to Gerard Butler’s new racing base a few days before I had seen the same jaw-jutting determination as that kestrel displayed. Previously a salaried trainer operating from Erik Penser’s Churn Estate on the Oxfordshire Downs, Gerard has now set up on his own in Cadland Stables at the foot of Warren Hill in Newmarket, within a stone’s throw of Sir Mark Prescott’s Heath House yard.
Wasn’t it a bit daunting, I asked him, on setting out on your own operation to move straight to ‘Headquarters’ in competition for owners with the likes of Sir Michael Stoute, Michael Jarvis and Luca Cumani? There was not a moment’s hesitation as he replied, ‘This is the place to be. If you want to make movies you’ve got to go to Los Angeles. If you want class football you go to Wembley. If you want to make it in racing you come to Newmarket. This is the hub of it all. This is where it happens.’ But surely the Newmarket Heath gallops are a very different proposition to the Oxfordshire downland? ‘It’s all to do with the horses. It doesn’t matter if you are training in a desert plain or on a mountainside. If they are not coping with it you have to point a finger at the trainer. The facilities are so good that if the horses are not responding Newmarket will expose you.’ It is different, he concedes. At Churn he was training in splendid isolation. ‘Here you are walking on behind someone else’s horses or you have them beside you. The horses face more of a challenge in their environment, more stress. But you have to get on with that. They will be healthier horses later on because of it.’ The spiky-haired trainer with the rapidfire delivery and the bushwacker hat is not exactly short of experience. Before setting up on his own he worked in Britain with John Dunlop, in Australia with Colin Hayes, in Ireland with John Oxx and in America with D.Wayne Lucas. From the American maestro, he says, he absorbed the work ethic above all else. ‘He worked hard, gave huge attention to detail and never left anything to chance.’ Gerard’s own website promises perspiration as well as inspiration and he quotes Wayne Lucas’s advice on commitment: ‘Think of it like a ham-and-eggs breakfast. The chicken has an involvement. The pig made a commitment.’ Success came swiftly at Churn when he won a Coral Eclipse with Compton Admiral in only his second season. Other standard bearers have included Beauchamp King, Nayyir, Elusive City and Jack Sullivan, a regular winner on the international circuit in Dubai. Nayyir and Jack Sullivan, now reduced to more humdrum roles, are among the 50-plus animals he has brought with him to Newmarket for owners who include the shrewd Michael Tabor. ‘I may not have the best horses in Newmarket, but I certainly have two of the best hacks.’ Switching stables can be tricky but it has not taken Gerard long to make his mark from the new base. He planned to get them settled first then step up the tempo. ‘I was quite pleased with how the first few runners went, but then one or two were flattening out in their races and I thought maybe I had gone a bit too soon with them.’ So he took a step back and prepared for the King George meeting at Ascot, due the weekend after I saw him. ‘The test will be how they go there,’ he said, and it was a test which Cadland House passed with flying colours. Good Again won the first race of the meeting and the classy filly Baharah, for whom an international career beckons, won her race too. He followed up last week by winning at Goodwood with Pashattack, which he rated one of the most promising two-year-olds, along with Just Like Silk and Trojan Reef.
The aim this year for the trim black-andcream yard with the welcoming flower tubs is realistic. ‘I would like to look back at the end of the year and say, “We moved, we didn’t break any limbs or spill any blood and the horses have picked up their form and got back to being consistent.”’ That target seems eminently achievable already, so how are the 60 local competitors taking the arrival of the perky new challenger?
Gerard Butler stresses that he has met nothing but friendliness from the established Newmarket teams. ‘I’ve not yet been invited for a cup of tea with Sir Michael. Dinner with the Cumanis is probably on hold for a while. But they have all been helpful and welcoming. And the irrepressible competitive streak shows through when he adds, ‘I don’t think Sir Michael Stoute is yet getting up in the morning saying “that Butler is a pain in the arse”. But when it gets to that stage then I’ll be happy.’
Previous page
