One of the most remarkable statewide political campaigns in recent memory came to an official end shortly after 9 a.m. Wednesday morning when DFL Senate candidate Walter Mondale strode to a hotel podium in downtown St. Paul and conceded the race to Republican Norm Coleman.

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About three hours later Coleman strode to the podium to address supporters with a conciliatory speech praising past senators of both parties, saying he hopes to continue a legacy of great senators coming out of the state.

"I am humbled by the support and the votes that I received yesterday, but I know that I have a lot of growing to do to fill the shoes I find myself in," Coleman said. "No matter if you carried a Mondale sign, a Wellstone sign or a Coleman sign I am dedicated to making you proud of me. We are going to come together."

He confidently spoke of working with state and federal officials to help Minnesota solve the problems the state faces. "We are going to move forward. We are going to build strong families. We are going to build a brighter Minnesota," he said.

He praised the late Sen. Paul Wellstone several times, saying he missed him in the final debate. "His legacy will be the standard he has set for passion and for energy and Minnesotans should expect those who hold this office to have that same passion and same energy and I will carry on that portion of his legacy."

Coleman and Wellstone were running a tight, expensive and nationally high-profile race when Wellstone was killed in a northern Minnesota plane crash late last month.

After five days of a campaign hiatus, the DFL tapped Democratic icon Mondale, who conducted a whirlwind five-day campaign, including a debate carried live on national television less than 24 hours before voters went to the polls.

Coleman went out of his way to praise Walter Mondale early in his speech, noting his graciousness during the phone call conceding the election. "Walter Mondale, by the way, is one of the greatest Minnesotans of the 20th century. We all honor his sense of duty and his skill of statesmanship," Coleman said.

Coleman addressed his supporter less than three hours after Mondale strode to the podium in a St. Paul hotel.

"It appears that this election has been decided and a few minutes ago I called Sen.-elect Coleman to congratulate him on his success and wish him and Laurie the best in his new assignment," Mondale told supporters.

Mondale called the brief campaign "one of the most unbelievable moments in Minnesota history.

"At the end of what will be my last campaign, I want to say to Minnesota, you always treated me well," he added.

Coleman is expected to meet his supporters before noon at the Radisson South hotel in Bloomington.

At 6 a.m., Coleman was leading Mondale by nearly 60,000 votes with more than 1.8 million ballots counted and The Associated Press had declared Coleman the winner.

It was Coleman's first win in a statewide race after getting edged out in Gov. Jesse Ventura's surprising win in 1998 when the former St. Paul mayor was running for governor.

Coleman ran a frenetic campaign down to the wire, hitting 16 cities between the end of Monday's hastily arranged debate with Mondale and the opening of polls Tuesday morning.

The vote counting headed into Wednesday morning as election officials counted the race's supplemental ballots by hand. Coleman's win capped a Republican landslide in Minnesota and around the country.

He was the chosen candidate of President George W. Bush and Bush, and Vice President Dick Cheney visited Minnesota several times to raise money and rally support for Coleman.

The roller-coaster Senate race that was turned upside down in the wake of the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone was the focus of much of the political attention.

Results of that balloting came in slower than other races as the candidates watched results from Twin Cities hotel rooms.

Mondale first emerged from his hotel room at the Radisson Hotel in downtown St. Paul at about 9:15 p.m. and mingled with the assembled DFLers gathered to watch returns.

At 10 p.m. Coleman spoke to reporters off camera and said he was getting butterflies with each new round of results and was waiting to address his supporters and thank them for their work on his campaign.

The early returns showed Coleman ahead of Mondale, but by 11 p.m. the race had narrowed as no returns from Ramsey County had come in and limited reports were coming in from the Iron Range.

The initial returns were coming in mainly from southern and western Minnesota.

Mondale returned to the ballroom at about 11:45 p.m. to cheers of supporters who chanted "We want Fritz."

He disputed reports that more than 45 percent of precincts had reported in the Senate race. Instead, he said that no more than 8 percent of precincts had counted the Senate race and that "some of the best-looking precincts you ever saw in your life have yet to report."

But the polls didn't turn around for Mondale, a DFL icon pulled into the race for a five-day campaign following the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone.

Turnout Extremely Heavy Across State

The polls have closed across Minnesota and the waiting has begun as election judges across the state start counting the supplemental ballots for the U.S. Senate race by hand.

That counting came after reports of heavy voter turnout -- and hints of record turnout -- across the state throughout the day. Lines remained past 8 p.m. at some polling places, and Minnesotans waiting in line at 8 p.m. were allowed to vote.

At one Bloomington church, some people waited up to three hours to vote. Voters brought lawn chairs and water bottles as they waited in line. Some voters reportedly left two or three times before coming back to vote, while others left in frustration.

While the Senate race has drawn most of the attention both in Minnesota and outside the state, there are scores of other elections with ramifications at both the state Capitol in St. Paul and U.S. Capitol in Washington.

There are predictions that results of the Senate race may not be fully tabulated before Wednesday morning and even beyond if there is a legal challenge to how absentee ballots were handled in the wake of the death of Sen. Paul Wellstone.

With those numbers staying in the background into the late evening, the hard-fought, four-way governor's race will take on the high profile early.

The race took off in June when Gov. Jesse Ventura announced he wouldn't seek a second term.

That left the field open for two ranking legislators who were endorsed by the state's two long-standing parties. DFLer Roger Moe, the Senate majority leader, and Republican Tim Pawlenty, the House majority leader, both won their party's nomination.

They were joined in the race by Tim Penny, a former DFL congressman in the early 1990s turned independent who ran after serving as a political adviser to Ventura. Penny received the nod of the Independence Party in that race.

They are joined by Ken Pentel of the Green Party, who has consistently polled in the lower single digits in the waning weeks of the campaign. After the three other candidates ran closely in the polls, published polls in the last 10 days showed Penny's support slipping with Moe and Pawlenty running in a statistical tie.

Penny disputed those recent polls, and said on Twin Cities television even before the polls closed that the reported heavy turnout plays to his favor.

The four took part in numerous debates in all corners of the state in the last several months.

There is also a congressional race that has proven to be a hard-fought, tooth-and-nail campaign. That is in the 2nd District, where incumbent Bill Luther is squaring off against John Kline for the third time, having narrowly beaten Kline in each of the last two races.

Luther moved a few miles into the district to face Kline after redistricting put him and Mark Kennedy in the same district.

Redistricting has also affected legislative races, putting each state House and Senate seat up for grabs, in some cases pitting incumbents against one another and in others leaving the race open.

There are about 75 school referendums on ballots Tuesday, including about 25 in the metro area.