RACINE, Wis. — Rob Zerban is still getting used to the idea of running a campaign — let alone one against Republican vice presidential hopeful Paul Ryan in a House race.

“I almost voted early,” Zerban said in an interview outside of a Michelle Obama rally here in Racine last month. “And my campaign manager almost killed me. He said, ‘Are you kidding me? You can’t give up that photo op.’”

Slight early-voting hiccups aside, however, Zerban is proving to run the most effective campaign in Wisconsin's 1st Congressional District in more than a decade against Ryan, who is running a less-publicized second campaign that he hopes, in the end, won’t matter.

Democrats are more bullish about their chances than ever with Zerban (pronounced Zer-BAHN) running against Ryan — he outraised Ryan in the third quarter of fundraising, and he is gaining national media attention as his opponent has been thrown into the spotlight of the presidential election.

"It's shaping up really well," Zerban said, outside of a rally where he had just been shouted out by First Lady Michelle Obama. "The national media spotlight is on him. And people in the district are seeing a side that they aren't familiar with with Paul Ryan."

Zerban sees the fight as largely personal. He sees the entitlement reforms in Ryan's budget as catastrophic — because he grew up in a single-parent household, eating government-subsidized lunches and going to culinary school thanks to government loans. He eventually started a catering business, and credits much of his success to the doses of government help he got along the way.

That business experience also gives the race a unique contrast to that of the other race in which Ryan is embedded. In the presidential race, much of Mitt Romney's platform revolves around his business experience, which he says will help him provide a path of growth for the economy. In the Wisconsin House seat race, Ryan is the candidate lacking much private-sector experience.

"I've been a part of a business — I've created jobs," Zerban said. "Paul Ryan has never created jobs."

Zerban is quiet and reserved in person, but he is not afraid to take heavy shots at Ryan and his plan.

In nearly a 10-minute conversation, he hurled accusations that Ryan is part of a group of Republicans that wants to "drown" Medicare and Medicaid "in their bathtub." He also slammed Ryan for never agreeing to a debate with him in the district, dismissing Ryan as "Mitt Romney's waterboy, jettisoning around the country."

Tough words only go so far, but Zerban and his staff and supporters are bullish for a number of reasons. For one, Zerban's internal polling before the Republican National Convention put him only 8 points behind Ryan — with room for improvement, his campaign rationalizes, as voters get to know him more. He also outraised Ryan in third-quarter fundraising, though he has nowhere close to the war chest that Ryan has built up. Finally, there's a boost from being on a national ticket — even in his base.

"I never really thought about this race before," said Barbara Ford, a voter outside Michelle Obama's rally who described herself as a "die-hard liberal." "I think we've got a good candidate this time around."

Still, most political insiders in Wisconsin don't give Zerban much of a chance. Ryan has never won the House race with less than 57 percent of the vote. And though Marquette Law School pollster Charles Franklin said that that number could be closer this time around, Ryan's incumbent advantage — and a boost from a national campaign — are too big of burdens for the challenger Zerban to overcome.

Of course, Zerban disagrees.

"I think people really do care about these things that are important to them — Medicare, Medicaid — that he wants to privatize and voucherize," Zerban said. "These are things that people perceive as basic fairness."