Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, November 9, 1994                   TAG: 9411090112
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WAS IT IMPECCABLE TIMING OR JUST PLAIN LUCK?

With his political fate in the balance, U.S. Sen. Charles Robb slipped away to his Capitol Hill office for several hours Tuesday afternoon to catch up on Senate paperwork.

``It's out of my hands now,'' said Robb, who appeared exhausted, yet at peace with himself. ``I'm confident that we have done everything that we can do, everything we ought to do.

``We were going to run it very much as a traditional campaign. We've done that - for better or for worse - according to my schedule.''

Until the final weeks of the campaign, Robb often seemed a mere bystander to the charismatic Republican Oliver North. Democrats will forever debate whether Robb was an under-appreciated strategist with impeccable timing or an extraordinarily lucky guy who won in spite of himself.

It made no difference Tuesday night to the 500 Democrats who stomped, shouted and screamed as Robb delivered his victory speech in the ballroom of the Tysons Corner Ritz-Carlton Hotel.

``His timing was excellent,'' Lt. Gov. Don Beyer said. ``Jefferson suggested you can always trust the voters. We did, and they came through.''

Robb's big day began shortly after sunrise. He had been scheduled to vote at 6:30 a.m. at Langley High School in McLean, but aides delayed his arrival 20 minutes to avoid independent Marshall Coleman, who showed up to get some exposure from the 10 television crews waiting for Robb. Only four TV crews had turned up at Coleman's nearby home precinct.

Robb voted along with his wife, Lynda, and his two oldest daughters. ``I'm absolutely certain that I just got one vote,'' Robb quipped, ``and I have reasonably high expectations to having received three more.''

Thefamily then went separate ways, Lynda and daughters to greet voters at local precincts, Robb to his campaign office in a suburban shopping center for several drive-time radio interviews.

Campaign manager Susan Platt sought guidance from the stars. ``Check out Robb's horoscope,'' she urged press secretary Bert Rohrer. ``He's a Cancer.''

Rohrer sucked on a filterless Camel and reached through the clutter on his desk for The Washington Post. He read aloud: ``Previous feeling of being left out vanishes. People comment, `You seem so vital!' Focus on independence, originality, being vulnerable to love.''

To Platt, it was a sign of good things to come.

Robb appeared relaxed despite his starched white dress shirt, conservative burgundy tie, pinstriped slacks and black wingtips.

He credited his final burst of momentum to three factors, none of which were his own doing. He cited North for committing gaffes nearly every time he got off script; Nancy Reagan for her denunciation of North as a liar; and former Gov. Douglas Wilder - who ran as an independent, dropped out and subsequently endorsed Robb - for following through on his endorsement by energizing black Virginians.

Robb even talked briefly about the personal tribulations that have dogged him for six years and his hope that a victory would offer the possibility for political redemption.

``I think it will put it behind us,'' he said.

Then he planted himself behind his Senate desk, put on his bifocals and started to go through the paperwork that had piled up while he was on the campaign trail.

Bone-tired from three weeks of campaigning, Robb had the calm of a marathoner who had the finish line in sight.

``At some point, I may find that I am mortal like the rest of the folks and catch up for a little bit for what may be a long and perhaps somewhat draining event emotionally - no matter how it comes out.''

Keywords:
ELECTION