Democrats may have a decent shot for the first time in three decades at picking up the seat of retiring two-term GOP Senator Wayne Allard, with Dem Congressman Mark Udall officially entering the race to succeed the two-term incumbent.

The Associated Press reports that Udall filed his long-expected papers yesterday to enter the 2008 contest — a top-priority race for national Democrats, who smell the chance at a pickup now that the state has seen the elections of new Democratic Congressmen, state legislators, a Governor and a Senator in the last few years.

Udall is not expected to have any signicant opposition in the primary, and he also announced that he's raised the significant sum of $1.5 million, a good amount for a Western state like Colorado. The GOP, by contrast, doesn't yet have a candidate for the seat, which has been in GOP hands since 1978.