There is more polling data in this election season than ever before. The press tends to concentrate on one question: Who is ahead? In this election season the answer so far has been obvious: Clinton. A closer look at the survey research data as well as some past election results and other facts reveals that there is more in play than meets the eye.

Each quadrennium the buzz focuses on the horse race. Is the Clinton horse way ahead? Is the Clinton horse a lock? Will the Democratic horses recapture the Congress? What do the polls show at the eight furlong mark?

But smart horse players don't only consider the horses. They ask about the race track. Is the course fast or slow? Dry or wet? Some horses do particularly well in sloppy conditions and are known as "mudders."

What about the race track for the election of 1996? That was the general subject on the PBS program Think Tank, which I moderate. Specifically, the topic was: "Can Dole win?"

Everett Ladd is a distinguished political scientist, author, director of the Institute for Social Inquiry at the University of Connecticut, and director of the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research. He is as good as they get in survey research.

Mr. Ladd: "My view is that if you look at all the data that are out there and just cut out the trial heats, you would not advance the case that it's a likely Clinton victory. The composite of the data, other than the trial heats, points otherwise. Now, if you believe the trial heats, which are averaging 15 points or something of that kind, of course, the election is over. Since I don't think those numbers mean much of anything, I'm less inclined to."

"Other than the trial heats?" you may ask. Right. Except for that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?

But Ladd has reasons for dissing the match-ups. He notes that half the voters have not yet made up their minds. He cites data to show "an enormously unanchored electorate . . . the idea that this election is locked in is wrong."

Here is a sketch of the Dole-friendly track brought up in the program:

By 2 to 1, voters self-identify as conservative over liberal (with a plurality of moderates).

In the last seven presidential elections, 24 states went Republican at least six times--for a total of 235 electoral votes (of the 270 needed for victory). Only one state went Democratic in the same time frame. (Guess which: atosenniM spelled backward.)

Most of the generic polls for Congress show the Democrats mildly ahead. But in surveys since 1956, Republicans averaged 8.5 points lower than the actual election results. If that holds, the GOP holds the Congress.

There have been double-digit closures between the candidates in four of the postwar presidential elections, including a 15-pointer by the losing Ford-Dole ticket in 1976.

Issue profiles of voters more closely fit Republicans than Democrats: 83 percent want a balanced budget, 79 percent favor the death penalty, 74 percent want term limits, 59 percent want public-private school choice (Gallup data).

Voters believe social and moral issues are more important than economic ones (53 percent to 42 percent).

Republicans are only now beginning serious spending to match Democratic advertising.

Mr. Clinton's "re-elect" numbers are only between 51 to 52 percent--with 50 percent regarded as the point where an incumbent is in trouble.

Moreover: (A) Does a sitting governor help a presidential candidate? Today about 75 percent of the voters are in states with Republican governors. (B) Scandals? Still around, with a majority of voters finding flaws in Mr. Clinton's "character." (C) Mood? Most voters believe the country is "on the wrong track," although by lesser proportions than earlier. (D) Expect the unexpected? Will Saddam end up ahead?

Of course, President Clinton has a few little things going for him. He is president. There is peace. And prosperity. He is a hell of a campaigner, particularly in Republican garb. He is one smart cookie. Those trial heats count for something. That is why three members of the Think Tank panel didn't give Mr. Dole much shrift: Stephen Hess of the Brookings Institution, Frank Newport, president of Gallup, and Allen Lichtman of George Washington University.

Still, I lean toward a Laddian view. But I would not go as far as he did when he said: "The race is going to be decided in a plus- or minus-4 range. That is, Clinton is going to win by 4 or lose by 4. That's the range in which we're operating. And the odds obviously point to Clinton on the plus side, but if it's in that range, and I believe it is, it's up for grabs."

That's getting pretty specific, particularly putting a 4-point ceiling on Mr. Clinton. But Mr. Ladd's general idea makes sense.

Is the track getting muddy and doleful?

Ben J. Wattenberg is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of Values Matter Most (Free Press, 1995).