CHARLESTON -- Anne Barth's Democratic primary victory in the 2nd Congressional District was just a few minutes old, but her mind was already on bigger challenges.

The longtime aide to U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd beat her two Democratic rivals convincingly, but Republican incumbent U.S. Rep. Shelley Moore Capito is a more formidable opponent.

"It's going to take a strong, grass-roots coalition throughout the district," Barth said at her campaign headquarters on Tuesday. "It's going to take the old-fashioned way of campaigning, going out and meeting people, talking to them face-to-face."

Barth didn't say it, but it's also going to take money. West Virginia University political scientist Neil Berch estimates a challenger must raise between $500,000 and $700,000 to pose a credible threat to four-term incumbent Capito.

Capito has about $974,000 on hand, according to the latest filing with the Federal Election Commission, while Barth's latest report put her available cash at roughly $327,000.

But money alone won't win the seat, which Capito has defended from a series of well-financed Democratic challengers.

Stretching from Point Pleasant on the Ohio River to the Washington, D.C., commuter belt towns of the Eastern Panhandle, the 2nd District forces candidates to rack up hundreds of miles on the campaign trail and spend money on ads in at least three different media markets.

Capito, the daughter of former congressman and governor Arch Moore, has used her name recognition and widely praised constituent service to win votes not only in the Republican-dominated panhandle, but also in the Democrat-rich population center of Kanawha County.

"I have always faced tough elections and the liberal special interests in Washington will once again attempt to distort my record," Capito said Wednesday. "A race about issues and not partisan, personal attacks are what the voters expect and what they deserve."

Capito was alluding to a likely theme of Barth's campaign: Tying the popular Republican to the unpopular Bush administration.

"Her failing is not her personality, her failing is casting her lot with George Bush," state Democratic Party Chairman Nick Casey said of Capito. "She's going to cast her lot with John McCain, and the people of West Virginia know we can't have four more years of this."

Bush won West Virginia in the last two presidential elections. But a Suffolk University poll released Monday showed that 77 percent of Democrats and unaffiliated voters have an unfavorable opinion of the president.

The phone poll, conducted May 10-11, involved interviews with 600 likely voters. Capito must win some of those Democrats and independents over, since they make up the majority of voters in her district.

"In the eyes of independents and even Democrats in the state, I'm seen as very much willing to step away from the party label," she said, citing votes on stem cell research, trade and the Children's Health Insurance Program that were contrary to White House wishes. "I vote my district."

Democrats, though, will try to link Capito to Bush, an association that could hurt in a state where Republicans are outnumbered two-to-one, and where Capito is the lone Republican in the five-member congressional delegation.

"If they're going to beat Capito, this would be the year to do it," Berch said. "This will be a real test for her, although she has passed those tests before."