'He has a way with words all right' - how Paul Townend copes with Ruby Walsh's criticism

Paul Townend has described how he manages to block out criticism from top pundit Ruby Walsh, his predecessor as Willie Mullins' number one jockey – helped by the fact he became used to Walsh's forthright assessment from his days as an up-and-coming young rider.

Townend was speaking to the Racing Post for a major interview in Sunday's newspaper in which he reflects on the pressure of heading to the Cheltenham Festival with an astonishingly strong book of rides from the Mullins yard and goes through his leading hopes.

Walsh was once the man entrusted to ride the Mullins hotpots, but since swapping the weighing room for the television studio he certainly hasn't held back in his views on his former colleague, including at last year's meeting when he castigated Townend and Davy Russell for playing cat and mouse while Harry Cobden led them a merry dance on Stage Star in the Turners Novices' Chase.

Paul Townend: heading to the Cheltenham Festival with an astonishingly strong book of ridesCredit: Alan Crowhurst (Getty Images)

"We were watching each other," Townend accepted. "But I'm not listening to what's being said either because I don't have time to. I've enough going on in my own head, and I'm used to him going through me as well!

"Ruby's opinion carries a lot of weight with the public, I suppose, and he has a job to do, but the turnaround is so quick you don't have time to dwell on it. You can hear it on the telly, so you might be aware of it, but you have so much going through your mind that it goes over your head at the time."

Asked if Walsh's iconic status meant his criticism still stings, Townend added: "No, and that's probably because I'm used to it. From the time I was an apprentice, the way I looked at it was that when he was having a go at me, and he was good and hard on me about different rides, to me it meant I was doing something right to grab his attention in the first place that he was bothered to put in the time to watch my rides.

"He has a way with words all right, but you have to look at the positives with these things."

Read more from Paul Townend in The Big Read, available in Sunday's newspaper or online for Members' Club Ultimate subscribers from 6pm on Saturday. Click here to sign up.

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