PICK A HORSE . . . ANY HORSE . . .

This is the Diversity Derby. There’s something for everybody:

* Three fillies--two of them horses, one a trainer.

* Two geldings.

* A California-bred.

* A horse that has come all the way from Dubai. Actually, two came but only one, Worldly Manner, will run. Their owner, Sheik Mohammed al Maktoum, the crown prince of Dubai, scratched Aljabr on Friday.

* And there’s another horse in the field, Desert Hero, that runs for another prince, Ahmed Salman of Saudi Arabia.

Today’s 125th Kentucky Derby, to be run before about 140,000 at Churchill Downs, has everything but the partridge in the pear tree.

Most of the successful trainers from the 1990s are here, with Nick Zito, Wayne Lukas and Carl Nafzger vying for attention with the end-of-the-decade upstart, Bob Baffert.

He says he has no sense of history--no disrespect intended--but Baffert is on the verge of rewriting it. Only five other trainers--most recently Lukas in 1995-96--have won two consecutive Derbies, and Baffert will be trying to make a triumvirate out of the run that already includes Silver Charm and Real Quiet. Indeed, Baffert would already have his three in a row if Grindstone hadn’t caught his Cavonnier at the wire in 1996.

Baffert is pulling out all the stops. He’s running one of each--the colt Prime Timber, the gelding General Challenge and the filly Excellent Meeting.

Excellent Meeting might have run in Friday’s Kentucky Oaks, but Baffert persuaded her owners, John and Betty Mabee, to be bold.

“I could have started five horses in the [Derby] if I wanted to,” Baffert said, alluding to Silverbulletday, who devastated the Oaks field, and Finder’s Gold, another Mabee horse of some promise.

Lukas, who has won the Derby three times, once more than Baffert, is running Cat Thief and Charismatic today, and figures that Baffert and Eddie Plesa Jr., the trainer of the other filly, Three Ring, are making mistakes. Lukas trained the last four fillies that have run in the Derby, winning the race with one of them, Winning Colors, in 1988.

“These two fillies have not been tested against colts and until you do that, you don’t know what you have,” Lukas said. “Winning Colors came into the Derby after winning the Santa Anita Derby. Serena’s Song [16th in the 1995 Kentucky Derby] had won the Turfway Park race [the Jim Beam] against the boys before she came here. We knew what we had going in.”

Excellent Meeting wouldn’t have been favored in the Oaks, because of stablemate Silverbulletday, whose best distance is 1 1/8 miles, not the 1 1/4 of the Derby. As it is, Excellent Meeting and General Challenge will be coupled in the betting and are likely to go off favored, although Prime Timber, Baffert’s other horse, could also be favored by post time.

Nobody should want to be favored. In one of the strangest patterns of any race, no favorite has won the Derby since Spectacular Bid in 1979.

Geldings don’t do well in the Derby, either. Since Clyde Van Dusen won in 1929, 74 geldings have been unsuccessful. Cavonnier came the closest.

General Challenge is also the California-bred, which gives him extra baggage besides the 126 pounds all of the males carry--the fillies carry 121. Only three Cal-breds have won here, none since Decidedly in 1962. The Mabees finished second with another California-bred, Best Pal, in 1991, and last year they might have had the favorite, but Event Of The Year cracked a knee eight days before the race.

Despite having been castrated before he ever ran, General Challenge likes to test the humans in his company. Baffert will saddle him away from the rest of the field, which became a 19-horse affair when Aljabr was scratched. Aljabr came up lame, according to Tom Albertrani, an assistant trainer.

Talking about General Challenge, jockey Gary Stevens said, “You could point this horse at a brick wall and he’d run through it.”

Stevens rode Worldly Manner, one of the Dubai horses, when he was owned by the Mabees last year. Together they were third in the Hollywood Juvenile and won the Best Pal Stakes at Del Mar.

“I give him a big chance,” Stevens said. “Last year, he looked like a 4-year-old running against 2-year-olds. This year he looks like a 6-year-old running against 3-year-olds.”

The speed today will probably be provided by Three Ring, Cat Thief and Vicar. General Challenge should be in the next tier, ready to pounce in the final quarter-mile. Although Churchill Downs’ stretch, at 1,234 1/2 feet, is one of the longest anywhere, the truth is that the Derby is usually won by the horse leading at the eighth pole.

“I don’t think the pace will be crazy [fast],” Stevens said. “Which means that the riders behind the speed will need to adjust. That’s what it takes to win a Derby, getting a horse to adapt.”

The female trainer is Akiko Gothard, Japanese-born, who will saddle the longshot K One King. The best finish by a woman trainer was Casual Lies’ second for Shelley Riley in 1992. Kathy Walsh trained Hanuman Highway, who was seventh last year.

The other gelding running, besides General Challenge, is Valhol, whose disputed victory in the Arkansas Derby was only his third start. Since 1955, only five horses have run in the Derby off three starts or fewer. The best finish by any of them was 12th.

Dallas Keen, a trainer who wears a black cowboy hat about half as big as his horse, has been patiently answering questions all week about the possibility that Valhol’s jockey, Billy Patin, might have “plugged in” with an illegal electrical device in the Arkansas Derby. It wasn’t until Tuesday that an Arkansas judge ordered Oaklawn Park to release the $300,000 winner’s purse, money Valhol needed to qualify for an overflow field.

Between inquisitions, Keen has trained on with Valhol, and the horse has been sharp in the mornings. It was surprising to some that Mike Battaglia, the Churchill Downs handicapper, thought so little of Valhol that he relegated him to the five-horse mutuel field.

“That’s all right,” Keen said. “In the Louisiana Derby, we finished fourth at 107-1. In the Arkansas Derby, we won at 30-1. At least our odds will be going down for this one.”

Patin, who hasn’t ridden in three weeks, has been benched in favor of jockey Willie Martinez.

Jim Jackson, who owns a farm near Austin, Texas, bought Valhol for $350,000, small change compared to what Sheik Mohammed paid the Mabees for Worldly Manner--a reported $5 million.

But money doesn’t always talk at the Derby, even though more than $50 million will be bet on this 125th running. Silver Charm and Real Quiet, Baffert’s Derby winners, were bought for a total of just over $100,000.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

A Three-Bagger?

Bob Baffert, who won the 1997 Kentucky Derby with Silver Charm and repeated last year with Real Quiet, would become the first trainer to win three in a row if General Challenge, Excellent Meeting or Prime Timber wins today. Here’s the list of the five previous trainers who won two consecutive Derbies:

*--*

Trainer Winners Next Year Dick Thompson Burgoo King, 1932 Bazaar (9th) Brokers Tip, 1933 Ben Jones Citation, 1948 No Starter Ponder, 1949 Jimmy Jones Iron Liege, 1957 No Starter Tim Tam, 1958 Lucien Laurin Riva Ridge, 1972 No Starter Secretariat, 1973 Wayne Lukas Thunder Gulch, 1995 Deeds Not Words (13th) Grindstone, 1996

*--*

The Facts

* Post: 2:30 PDT

* Where: Churchill Downs, Louisville, Ky.

* TV: 1:30 p.m., Ch. 7

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