ONGBOAT KEY, Fla. - Al Gore, who likens his first debate with George W. Bush to a job interview, yesterday practiced before some of those who will do the hiring, 12 regular Americans he hopes will be part of a majority to elect him president.
''So you think the key is to handle it like a conversation with a small group of people,'' the vice president said as he spoke with the group over lunch at Charley's Crab in Sarasota. Later, they critiqued him as he engaged in a mock debate.
Across the Gulf of Mexico, Bush spent a second day at his 1,500-acre ranch in central Texas as the clock ticked toward Tuesday night's face-off at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. He concentrated on policy books before seeking relief with a jog, a walk with his wife, and some time chopping cedar trees, aides said.
Supporters of both the Democratic and Republican nominees hit the Sunday-morning talk show circuit, with Massachusetts Governor Paul Cellucci advocating for Bush on NBC's ''Meet the Press.''
''Governor Bush is ready, he's prepared. He wants to speak to the American people without that filter, tell them about his plans. And tell them that he trusts them and that Al Gore would rather trust people in Washington rather than people across America,'' he said.
Yet Bush got a tart assessment of his campaign from Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson, who urged the Texas governor to attack the vice president in order to energize his Republican base.
''He's got to begin hitting Gore where Gore's vulnerable: the big spending, possibly doubling the size of government,'' Robertson said on the CBS program ''Face the Nation.'' ''He's got to come out swinging like a fighter. And if he doesn't do it, if he continues this sort of be-nice sort of approach, I think he's going to lose.''
While eschewing the campaign trail for debate preparations, Gore waged a subtle bid for Florida's pivotal 25 electoral votes by splitting his time between the Colony Beach and Tennis Resort on Longboat Key, where he is staying until tomorrow, and the Mote Marine Laboratory. The shark-research facility has an auditorium that has been set up as a debate hall.
Gore also had lunch with 12 of his 13 ''special guests'' his campaign has invited to Florida, so the vice president can hear their perspective on the issues and their reaction to his debate answers. Many are people Gore has met on the campaign trail. The 13th, Winifred Skinner of Des Moines, Iowa, who last week caught Gore's attention with her tale of collecting cans to pay her bills, was driving a motorhome to Boston.
One of those in Florida, Atlanta firefighter Matt Moseley, gained international fame when he dangled from a helicopter to rescue a stranded construction worker during a blaze. He urged Gore to treat the debate like a conversation with a small group.
Aboard Air Force II on Saturday, Gore told reporters: ''I see the debate kind of like a job interview, and that's why I want to spend a lot of time with people who are representative of the ones who are doing the hiring.''
On ''Meet the Press,'' former Clinton adviser Paul Begala, who is playing Bush in Gore's mock debates, hinted at the vice president's strategy: seek contrasts with the governor on issues like prescription drugs and the minimum wage, but treat the 90-minute debate as a chance to speak directly to voters about his plans.
''The interesting thing I saw in this campaign was at the convention, when Al Gore stood up there with no filter ... he went from about 15 points behind to dead even or ahead,'' Begala said.
Cellucci indicated a central Bush theme would be his argument that Gore supports government while Bush supports the individual.
''He trusts families to spend their own money. He trusts parents to make educational choices for their children ... and he trusts seniors to choose their own health plans. Al Gore, I think, we'll find out, would rather trust Washington bureaucrats,'' Cellucci said.
At Bush headquarters in Austin, Texas, aides heralded a new poll showing Gore behind in his home state of Tennessee. Bush led 46 to 43 percent in the poll of 625 Tennessee voters published in the Nashville Tennessean and Chattanooga Times-Free Press yesterday. The margin of error was 4 percentage points.
''We wondered why the vice president wouldn't go to his own home state to prepare for the debates and maybe now we have seen why,'' said Bush spokesman Ari Fleischer. ''Those who know him best are those who like him least.''
Globe reporter Anne E. Kornblut, traveling with Bush, contributed from Austin, Texas.
