ATLANTA --- Sen. Saxby Chambliss led the Senate race in Georgia, but with hundreds of thousands of early voting ballots still being counted in key counties, it wasn't clear late Tuesday whether he had escaped a runoff.

To avoid a runoff, Mr. Chambliss needs more than 50 percent of the vote. With 97 percent of precincts reporting, he led with 51 percent, followed by Democrat Jim Martin at 46 percent and Libertarian Allen Buckley at 3 percent.

State elections officials said late Tuesday that early voting from Fulton and Gwinnett counties had yet to be counted. Early voting in those two counties alone totaled more than 275,000 votes.

The campaign started with most observers expecting Mr. Chambliss to win with little trouble. Polls showed him comfortably ahead until the financial crisis captured voters' attention about four weeks ago, and his lead quickly eroded.

National Democrats had put few resources into the race. But after Mr. Chambliss voted for the $700 billion financial bailout, Democrats from across the country and the national party pumped money in, allowing Mr. Martin to increase TV advertising.

Mr. Chambliss acknowledged that people had been upset with him over the bailout vote but they were coming to understand he had to do something.

"There are certain things you can control in a campaign and certain things you cannot," he said Tuesday night. "We could not control the economy."