WASHINGTON - Republican John McCain plans to define himself to voters before the Democrats do, with a cross-country "biography tour" and overseas travel that is meant to underscore his foreign-policy credentials.

With the national spotlight trained on the battle between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination, McCain will be competing for attention as he begins his campaign for the presidential election.

"McCain needs to be frequently visible in the national news," said former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating, a McCain adviser. "That's not impossible, but it will be difficult when your campaign's over and the country's waiting for the Democrats to select their candidate."

Having clinched the GOP nomination, the Arizona senator moved quickly into the next phase of his campaign.

During a four-hour visit to Washington on Wednesday, he had lunch at the White House, basked in the sun-drenched Rose Garden afterward as President Bush endorsed him, and met with officials of the Republican National Committee to collect a symbolic set of keys to the party headquarters.

Keeping voters' attention "will be tough" with everyone focused on the Democratic race, McCain said yesterday in Palm Beach, Fla.

He was in the South to campaign and raise money in Florida and Georgia. He plans to embark soon on a weeklong tour of places that marked turning points in his life - the Naval Academy in Annapolis, where he finished sixth from the bottom in the class of 1958; Pensacola, where he led a flight squadron, and his family's ancestral home in Mississippi.

"The purpose of this trip is to begin the process of introducing John McCain to the American people," spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said.

High-profile foreign travel is another way for McCain, 71, to keep his name in the news. He is to visit Europe and the Middle East this month as part of a congressional delegation, according to Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, an independent Democrat and McCain ally.

The lull before the Republican National Convention at the beginning of September may be a boon to McCain because it grants him time to transform his shoestring campaign into a national organization, unite the Republican Party, and raise money.

While that is going on, the Obama-Clinton seesaw race will continue.

Behind the scenes, McCain and his strategists also are working to bolster his economic, health-care, and environmental stances so he can project a stronger command of those topics.

Hazelbaker said McCain will give a series of speeches over the next several months to detail his positions on those issues. He also will address foreign policy, focusing on Iraq and the threats to the United States, she said.

The other crucial task is finding a running mate. So far, McCain has instructed aides only to "do some research on how other people have done it over the last 20 years or so," said Charlie Black, a Washington lobbyist and McCain confidant. "We don't see any urgency in this."

The process itself can be important, said Republican strategist Scott Reed, who managed Bob Dole's 1996 GOP presidential campaign and played a key role in selecting Jack Kemp as Dole's running mate.

"It's the voters' first chance to see a nominee's decision-making process," Reed said. "How does he go about making this decision? How are people treated in this process? How will he make decisions in the White House? These get answers during this process."