Enumclaw trainer Frank Lucarelli did lot of winning this weekend, both at the race track and on a baseball field.

Sunday, Lucarelli’s 3-year-old colt, Posse Power made a successful Northwest debut with a 1 ¾-length victory in the $50,000 Auburn Handicap at Emerald Downs.

Saturday the trainer was the pitching coach for the Enumclaw High Hornets as the team won two games in the in the state baseball tournament, and next weekend the boys head to Safeco Field for a shot at the title.

Lucarelli’s son, Michael, is shortstop and a pitcher on the team.

In the Auburn Handicap at Emerald, Lucarelli tapped Francisco Duran to ride. It was the jockey’s fifth winner of the day. Posse Power ran 6 ½ furlongs in 1 minute, 15 seconds on a wet-fast track and paid $5.60, $3.40 and $4.60. The winner, trained by Lucarelli for Willow Creek Farm, carried co-high-weight of 120 pounds.

Lucarelli had a four-win day, which was his third at Emerald Downs. He took over first place in the trainer’ standings with 17 wins.

Saratoga Boot, Inoel Beato riding at 116 pounds, rallied inside and ran second paying $6.60 and $8.80.

It was 3 ¼ lengths back to Clear to Canada, ridden by Mario Gutierrez at 115 pounds, and an $11.60 show payoff. Seven Torrents and Forener completed the order of finish.

Forener, undefeated in three previous starts and the betting favorite, battled in an early speed duel with Seven Torrents, weakened in the stretch, and struggled home to finish fifth and last. Forener’s out-of-the-money finish helped produce the large show payoffs on the top three finishers.

Posse Power is a Kentucky-bred colt by Posse. The colt has competed against many of the top the top 3-year-olds on the West Coast. He finished eighth in the Grade 1 Santa Anita Derby and third in the in the Grade 3 El Camino Real Derby, and those credentials were good enough for local players to make him the second choice in the Auburn.

Biding his time, as Forener set a pressured pace of :22 and :44 3/5, Posse Power angled out nearing the stretch, reeled in the leaders with a furlong to run, and then held Saratoga Boot safe in the late stages.

“I had plenty of horse going into the stretch, and I felt like I had enough horse that I could be a little more patient,” Duran said. “I knew I had won the race at the sixteenth pole, but I asked him a little bit at the end, just to be on the safe side. He’s a classy horse, and the classy ones know where the wire is. He knows he did a good job today.”

Posse Power earned $27,500 to boost his bankroll to $95,940 for Willow Creek Farm, owned by Claire Lein from Fall City. Posse Power has a 3-2-2 mark in eight starts, with the first seven run on synthetic surfaces.

Forener, meanwhile, entered the contest having never trailed another horse, winning his races by 2, 9 and 1 ¾ lengths. The Auburn was his first stakes, and jockey Gallyn Mitchell said the Lost Soldier gelding turned in a puzzling effort.

“Forener seemed like he handled the track well,” Mitchell said. “He seemed sharper than usual. At the three-eighths pole, he just felt like he was done for some reason.”

Duran, riding his first season at Emerald Downs, turned in the first five-win day at Emerald Downs since Ricky Frazier rode five winners on Aug. 27, 2009. Kevin Radke and Seth Martinez share the track record of six wins in a day.

News and Notes

• Jockey Jose Zunino was taken to Valley General Hospital to have his shoulder x-rayed after a spill in the first race in which Liberated Maid sustained a broken leg.

• Lucarelli had a combined six wins Saturday and Sunday.

• Duran won the first on Scarlett’s Mark ($3.20), the fourth on Toy Toy Toy ($9.40), the fifth on Mirror Pond ($33.20), the sixth on Posse Power and the eighth on Margo’s Gift ($7.20).

• Although it was only a three-horse race, Margo’s Gift turned in one of the day’s most impressive efforts while running down the favored Siberian Cocktail for a neck victory in 1:09 1/5 for six furlongs. Best known as the winner of the $250,000 Favorite Trick Stakes in 2007, Margo’s Gift (21-8-3-3) had won just 2-of-13 subsequent starts and no stakes since the Pepsi-Cola Handicap on June 1, 2008. Owned by Elttaes Stable and trained by Doris Harwood, Margo’s Gift ranks second among active Washington-breds with $336,982 in earnings.

• Wasserman, No. 1 with $519,049, was among five horses scratched from the race won by Margo’s Gift.

• Pedro Terrero rode two more winners Sunday to cap an amazing weekend for the 25-year-old apprentice. He finished the week with nine wins, three Friday, four Saturday and two Sunday, just one shy of Frazier’s track record for a three-day week.

• Live racing resumes 6 p.m. Friday.