Roque puzzler Murphy Colm Murphy has been left puzzled by Quito De La Roque's performance in the Lexus Chase. The eight-year-old was sent off a warm favourite for the Leopardstown Grade One on the back of a five-race winning streak which included the scalp of Sizing Europe at Down Royal. But he could only finish an 11-length third to Synchronised, leaving Murphy scratching his head. "I was very disappointed to be honest," said Murphy. "In hindsight he just didn't gallop to the line like he has done in all his previous races. "He jumped the last and then just seemed to go up and down on the spot. "We'll never know how much his first race of the season took out of him. "We don't run them when they are not right but he'd had a few little issues before Down Royal and it maybe took him longer to recover than we expected. "All credit to the winner, he's improving, but I'd like to think we were better than that and I hope we'll be a different horse in the (Irish) Hennessy. "All we can put it down to is the fact it was very hard run first time out, if he'd had a run he might have recovered quicker. "He's come out of it OK, he didn't have a hard race compared to Down Royal and if we have a clean run up to the Hennessy I'll be happy," he told At The Races.
