DANNY Mullins marked his recent return from a serious back injury with a big race success as Royal Rendezvous justified 10/11 favouritism in the Grade 2 PWC Champion Chase at Gowran Park on Saturday.

Mullins, who only returned to race-riding the previous day, was sidelined for nearly three months with fractured and crushed vertebrae from a fall at Limerick on July 10th and his fitness was certainly tested in the closing stages of this two-and-a-half-mile event.