The Virginian-Pilot
                             THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Sunday, October 30, 1994               TAG: 9410300073
SECTION: FRONT                    PAGE: A4   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: BY DAVID M. POOLE, STAFF WRITER 
                                             LENGTH: Short :   47 lines

NOTEBOOK

Notes from the past few days of the U.S. Senate campaign:

Taking stock of the race

Ollie North may be gaining in the opinion polls, but he's losing ground in cyberspace. The University of Iowa runs a computerized political stock market, where political junkies from around the world can plug in via the Internet to buy and sell ``shares'' in various political candidates based on how much of the vote they're expected to get in November.

Here's how the trading went this past week on Virginia's Senate race: NORTH - down 2.2 percent, to 37.5 percent. ROBB - up 0.6 percent, to 42.4 percent. COLEMAN - down 0.6 percent, to 13.9 percent

The investors seem pretty sure Robb's margin will hold. Some 60.5 percent are buying stock in Robb, thinking he will win. Only 38.9 percent are banking on a North victory.

Coleman? Almost no one is betting on the independent.

North ahead on campuses

North continues to be the BMOC - big man on campus - across Virginia. He's now 5-for-5 in college mock elections. At least the mock elections we've heard about, anyway.

He notched his three most recent victories at Hampden-Sydney, Richard Bland College in Petersburg and the Manassas branch of Northern Virginia Community College.

For anyone keeping score, here they are:

Hampden-Sydney: North 72 percent, Robb 15 percent, Coleman 12 percent.

Richard Bland College: North 74 percent, Robb 17 percent, Coleman 7 percent.

Northern Virginia Community College: North 49 percent, Robb 28 percent, Coleman 22 percent.

KEYWORDS: U.S. SENATE RACE VIRGINIA CANDIDATES by CNB