Retailers: Fab Four All the Way : The Beatles’ high-profile ‘Anthology’ set will outsell such big-name rivals as Garth Brooks and Bruce Springsteen, handicappers say.

Who will win on Super Tuesday?

No, not next year’s big presidential primary day. We’re talking about this Tuesday, when record stores will start selling new albums by the Beatles, Garth Brooks and Bruce Springsteen.

The release of any one of these would be a major event in the pop world, the kind of thing people would line up to buy.

But with all of them coming at once, who will draw the biggest lines? The Fab Four? The Country King? The Boss?

Or would you put money on one of the other superstar releases of the past two weeks: the Whitney Houston-led “Waiting to Exhale” soundtrack and new albums by R. Kelly, Alice in Chains, Melissa Etheridge and Meat Loaf?

Just for fun, we thought we’d handicap the race.

For help, we turned to those who have the best read of the field: retailers. Our panel is made up of executives and buyers responsible for a total of more than 2,000 record stores across the nation: Jerry M. Comstock, Blockbuster music president; Stan Goman, Tower senior vice president of retail; Dick Odette, Musicland/Sam Goody vice president of purchasing; Bob Bell, Wherehouse new-release buyer; Lew Garrett, Camelot vice president of purchasing, and Bobby Hall, Virgin Megastore Hollywood buyer.

And the winner: The Beatles, wire-to-wire.

“It’s hard to bet against the Beatles with all that television and publicity,” says Garrett, referring to the two-disc “The Beatles Anthology Vol. 1,” which will benefit from ABC-TV’s three-part documentary series that begins tonight. “We sold last year’s ‘Beatles Live at the BBC’ very well without all that stuff.”

The experts expect that even with all the competition, the Beatles’ set will have first-week sales far surpassing the 360,000 for the “BBC” collection, also a double-disc package.

The No. 2 spot was also unanimous: Brooks, with odds a distant 2-1 that he could take the top spot from the Beatles.

“The Beatles and Brooks are the only two that if I were a betting man I’d bet on,” Comstock says.

So where does that leave Brooooce and his loyal fans? Fighting it out with “Exhale” for the No. 3 spot, with both coming in as 4-1 shots.

However, if you’re looking for a dark horse to back, here’s one that everyone in our panel believes has a good shot of sneaking into the Top 5 among the superstars: pop-classical ensemble Mannheim Steamroller’s “Christmas in the Aire,” which was released last month and is rapidly climbing the charts.

“You never know--that could sell as much as Bruce,” Comstock says. “Not to offend Bruce. If it was me choosing to buy one or the other, Bruce is what I’d buy.”