The Thoroughbred Owners and Breeders Association will honor national award winners at its awards dinner Sept. 7 at Fasig-Tipton in Lexington. Five national winners have been announced ahead of time, and BloodHorse Daily is offering profiles of these winners throughout the week.
Today we profile Time for Trouble , the Claiming Crown Horse of the Year.
Time for Trouble became the first horse in the Claiming Crown’s 25-year history to win the same Claiming Crown starter race back-to-back when he captured the Kent Stirling Memorial Iron Horse in 2023 at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots after capturing the race a year earlier at Churchill Downs.
Now Time for Trouble has a title befitting that unique accomplishment: 2023 Claiming Crown Horse of the Year.
The English Channel gelding gamely won two of seven starts in 2023 and earned $186,970, faring best in dirt routes. He prevailed in a photo finish over 2022 Preakness Stakes (G1) show finisher and Belmont Stakes (G1) competitor Creative Minister in an allowance optional claiming race at Keeneland in April 2023, and he ran down Proverb by a head in the Iron Horse on a sloppy track at Fair Grounds in his final start of the season.
Also in 2023, he ran second to dirt marathon specialist Next in the 1 3/4-mile Birdstone Stakes at Saratoga Race Course.
Only four starts on the turf last year resulted in performances less than his best for Louisville, Ky.-based trainer Jeff Hiles, who co-owns him with Thorndale Stable’s Paul Parker of Paducah, Ky.
Time for Trouble was bred in Kentucky by Calumet Farm out of the Galileo mare Starstruck.
In a National Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association press release announcing Time for Trouble as the Claiming Crown Horse of the Year, Hiles said of the Claiming Crown, “We’re going back in it this year, if he stays healthy.”
These are noteworthy achievements for a horse claimed for only $8,000 just over three years ago. Hiles and Parker won a 12-way shake, or random draw, when 11 others submitted a claim for Time for Trouble.
The gelding and Hiles and Parker will be recognized at the 39th annual TOBA National Awards Dinner Sept. 7 at Fasig-Tipton in Lexington.
“I think it’s wonderful that they give an award like this, anything you can do for guys like me,” Parker said in the National HBPA release. “It’s great to get any kind of accolade at the level I play at. I’ve got one mare I breed. I’ve got a shot of getting a good horse one day. But am I ever going to win the Breeders’ Cup? Am I able to even think about getting a Horse of the Year? I doubt it. But to get Claiming Crown Horse of the Year, that’s something.”
