Townend keeps his cool after fence woe
PAUL TOWNEND acknowledged the ‘good man behind me’ in Willie Mullins as he bounced back from his Tuesday trials with a wizard Wednesday at Punchestown. A treble aboard Pravalaguna, Next Destination and Patricks Park helped Townend erase the memory of his ‘brain freeze’ on Al Boum Photo. Townend insisted the incident was ‘behind us now’ as he looked to move on with the unqualified backing of Mullins. ‘It shows the mettle of the man after what happened yesterday. He was under a lot of pressure coming out today and was so cool,’ said Mullins. ‘You couldn’t write what happened on Tuesday, but we move on. It was one of those things. Paul’s forgotten about it and he’s on fire.’ Robbie Power felt for Townend after his Tuesday lapse which led to a 21-day ban. ‘For some reason Paul thought we were bypassing the last fence so he made a manoeuvre to bypass,’ said Power, whose mount Finian’s Oscar was taken out. ‘He (Townend) just got a brain freeze. It was a case of human error. He is a top-class jockey and will put it behind him. He’ll get a vote of confidence from Willie Mullins and just get on with it.’ The Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board posted Townend’s official explanation yesterday — 12 hours too late for punters and TV viewers left bewildered by what had transpired. ‘In his evidence, Paul Townend said that he was riding with his head down between the last two fences and heard roaring on his left which caught his attention. ‘He thought he had to bypass the fence but didn’t know which side to bypass on. ‘He panicked and commenced his move to bypass the fence on the right side. ‘He accepted in hindsight that there were no bypass procedures in place. ‘He said he made a genuine mistake and apologised for what occurred.’