Just to be clear, tonight’s debate is happening in Farmville, Virginia, and has nothing to do with FarmVille, the social network video game. It’s a college town of 8,000 that is so excited about its moment in the national spotlight tonight that it held a block party.

In the past few hours, Tim Kaine retweeted this report:

Could this hint at a line of attack tonight against Pence, whose voting record on LGBTQ issues has been under the microscope since he joined the Trump campaign?

An LGBTQ campaign group (coincidentally with the same initials as Hillary Rodham Clinton, but not linked to her) has also put this billboard up in Farmville:

Barbara Plett Usher
BBC News, Farmville

Don't expect the political theatre of the first presidential debate - these are two genial conventional middle aged men, so low key that more than 40% of Americans polled couldn't name them. This is their one chance in the spotlight to demonstrate they'd be the best man to step into president's shoes, if it comes to that.

But the evening will really be about the larger-than-life presidential candidates, especially Donald Trump: he had a bad first debate and a terrible week afterwards, with one controversy after another, and he's dropping in the polls.

Mike Pence is under pressure to defend, or deflect attention from Trump's conduct, and steady his campaign.

Tim Kaine, on the other hand, will try to carry forward a fresh burst of Democratic momentum. He'll also have to defend Hilary Clinton's character and reputation, but at the moment, it looks like he has the easier job.

Anthony Zurcher
BBC North America reporter

The story is more nuanced than the headline, but it's clear that Democrats - from Hillary Clinton on down - don't feel comfortable running on Obamacare as it's now operating due to impending premium hikes for those who don't benefit from subsidies (and it's particularly bad in states that didn't expand the Medicaid coverage to the poor).

It was always one of the risks of taking on healthcare reform singlehandedly - even if the current system is better than the mess it replaced, Democrats will still be held accountable for every problem with it. Insurance rates aren't going up as quickly as they used to? Doesn't matter - they're still going up. The only difference is Democrats are now on the hook for any bad news.

John Podesta just spoke to the press here and was asked about it, and he took what has become the campaign line - that Hillary Clinton wants to "strengthen" Obamacare, while Donald Trump wants to tear it up and has no plan to replace it. 

Of course, none of that is possible if Republicans control Congress - they're much happier seeing it collapse than to tweak it to make it more successful.

Oh, to have been a fly on the wall when Hillary Clinton heard about her husband's comments in Michigan on Monday night about Obamacare.

Bill Clinton ripped into the president's signature law, calling it "the craziest thing in the world" because of higher health insurance premiums for people who don't qualify for subsidies. He tried to reverse his comments on Tuesday, when his wife was also forced to artfully bat away questions about it. 

A few days ago, the prospect of Obamacare coming up in the debate tonight would have been considered awkward for Pence. He has bucked Republican orthodoxy by making his state of Indiana one of 31 to support the expansion of Medicaid, which is part of the law.

Now it could be Tim Kaine whose heart will sink if moderator Elaine Quijano, or Pence himself, brings up the healthcare subject tonight.

Image source, Paramount

1) He once compared the US to the Titanic

In a newspaper column back in 1997, after James Cameron's film Titanic came out, he saw parallels between that three-hour epic and his own country. 

His call for Americans to stop thinking that their economy was immune from danger makes for interesting reading after the 2008 crash.

You can read the full article here., external

2) He doesn't always agree with Trump

Here's what Pence told CNN last week when asked about climate change:

Here is what Trump has said about the issue in the past:

(This is far from the only time Pence's views have clashed with Trump's)

3) Pence has progressive roots

He told the Indianapolis Star in 2012 that liberal icons John F Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr inspired him to enter politics.

Pence, who has described himself as "a Christian, a conservative and a Republican, in that order", voted for Jimmy Carter in 1980.

It wasn't until college when he met his future wife, Karen, at an evangelical church that his views began to shift.

4) He's a Gamer

He told the New York Times, external that, days before his beloved Indianapolis Colts play their next NFL game, he'll tackle their upcoming rival on Xbox. "Maybe if I beat them first, the Colts have a better shot," he said. "My son kind of resists playing with me now because, frankly, I’m pretty good."

Mike Pence: Full profile

1. He speaks Spanish. Really well.

Here he is delivering a speech in Spanish to the Senate in 2013 (about a proposed immigration bill).

He learned the language while spending a gap year volunteering with Jesuit missionaries in Honduras.

2) He could have been VP long before

He was apparently on President Obama's shortlist of candidates for vice-president, but Joe Biden was picked instead. It was reportedly Bill Clinton who convinced Hillary to choose Kaine this time around.

3) He plays the harmonica

While he was born in Minnesota and raised in Kansas, his musical roots seem to be in the state he serves as senator, Virginia. He's a huge fan of bluegrass music, and has been known to whip out his harmonica on the campaign trail.

Here's him showing off his skills in 2009:

4) He's not a traditional Democrat by any means

His support for free trade and deregulating local banks have made him unpopular with more progressive members of the party.

A practising Catholic, he is personally opposed to abortion. While he is committed to the broader tenets of Roe v Wade, including a woman's right to choose, he supports restrictions on certain types of abortion, parental consent laws and "informed consent" practices.

Tim Kaine: Full profile

Eight days after Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump held a bruising first debate, their vice-presidential picks will aim to show they are fit to be a heartbeat away from the presidency.

Tim Kaine - Clinton's nominee - and Mike Pence - Trump's running mate - will hold a 90-minute battle of wits from 21:00 local time (01:00 GMT) in Virginia.

For both would-be veeps, it's an opportunity to shore up support for two historically unpopular White House candidates.

We'll bring you live coverage with all the latest lines from our correspondents at the face-off in Farmville, and across the country.

Image source, AP

That brings our live coverage to an end. Thanks for following.

The BBC will be covering all the key events in the lead-up to November's election across TV, radio and online.

You can read more of our coverage of the first debate below.

Clinton and Trump clash in first TV duel

Who won the debate?

Five Twitter takeaways

Fact checking the debate

Four ways gender played a role

BBC Radio 5 live

Democratic Party politician Kevin De Leon said Hillary Clinton gave a "solid" and "decisive" performance, whereas Republican supporter Shaun McCutcheon said Donald Trump "missed a lot of opportunities to nail it". 

James Naughtie
Special correspondent, BBC Radio 4 News

In the spin room, Hillary Clinton's chief of communications, Jennifer Palmieri, told me this presidential race was a "true battle for the Republic" in what is a very divided country.

That’s the truth of it: a divided a country indeed, with two candidates who may have delighted their own supporters in this debate and confirmed them in their choice.

The question is what happens with the others - the voters who for one reason or another warm neither to Clinton nor to Trump. What will they do? You would be foolhardy to think that this debate has settled that one.

Our correspondent says the debate was battle between a lawyer and a salesman.

He says Hillary Clinton controlled the debate with "forensic precision", while Donald Trump struggled to stay on course.

The lawyer successfully attacked Trump on his undisclosed tax returns and allegations about Barack Obama's birthplace, while the salesman managed to score some points by targeting her shifting stance on trade deals and long history as part of the political establishment.

But Anthony says that moderator Lester Holt played a key role, and the way he steered the debate favoured Mrs Clinton.

Read more of Anthony's analysis

Who is Lester Holt?

Image source, AP

Some viewers were a little confused to see Trump wearing a blue tie, the colour commonly associated with the Democratic Party - while Hillary Clinton was in red, associated with the Republican Party.

While most reaction focused on what the candidates were saying, some Clinton fans praised her sartorial choice.  

Image source, AP

The Associated Press has canvassed views on the debate from around the world.

China

"I personally like Trump's character and the feeling that he's a fighter,'' said Wang Pei, a graduate student in communications studies. "But from today's performance, I think Clinton was more like a mature politician and Trump looked a bit like a misfit in this kind of setting.'' 

Another graduate student, Ge Mengchao, said he thought Mr Trump would be "friendlier" to China because of shared commercial interests between China and the US.

"From the perspective of a businessman, he may take a friendlier approach to China.''  

Australia

Milton Gan, a Sydney-based photographer, said Mr Trump struggled to keep his cool. 

"He started interrupting Clinton, he started interrupting [moderator] Lester [Holt] and he started steamrolling. And you could see he was just getting really irate about everything,'' he said. 

"The most ridiculous thing was at the end when he said he had the better temperament to be president...It was just hilarious.

"But at the same time, underlying all of this is the fact that there's a really serious world leader's position at stake and he's one of the contenders. And it's pretty scary.'' 

But Richard McConochie, who watched the debate in a Canberra pub, said he thought "Trump aced it". 

"He came across as a man who could control himself. They said Trump's ignorant of the issues. I think he proved that he had at least a working handle on most of the stuff he was talking about.''

Japan

Analyst Narushige Michishita took issue with Mr Trump's criticism that US allies were free-riding under the US security umbrella.

While that was somewhat true in the 1970s and 1980s, he said, it was no longer the case today "given what Prime Minister Abe is doing to make Japan much more proactive on defense and security matters, and trying to make Japan more engaged in international security affairs.

"It's like, 'What are you talking about?'"

BBC Monitoring
News from around the globe

Russia

TV channel Rossiya 1 dubbed the debate an "exchange of caustic remarks" where "Russia was one of the key topics". Channel One called it an "uncompromising war of words".

Commentators at the independent Nesavisimaya Gazeta newspaper agree that Mr Trump appeals to Russian sympathisers in the US, who "like his proposal to restrict the access of illegal migrants to the country" and his lack of the "political correctness of which we are sick and tired". 

The debate is trending on Twitter in Russia, where some pro-Kremlin bloggers are hailing Mr Trump's performance.

The Arab world

Leading Arab satellite TV channels are covering the debate prominently, but with differing emphases. 

It is the lead story on Saudi-funded Al-Arabiya, which focuses on "heated arguments" over the economy and unemployment. It highlights a CNN poll , externalsaying 62% of viewers thought Mrs Clinton had won the debate. 

Qatar's Al-Jazeera focused on comments on the Middle East. Its Washington correspondent said Mr Trump tried to "hold Clinton responsible for the failure of [US] Middle Eastern policies" and causing "chaos in the region", while Mrs Clinton accused Mr Trump of lacking the skills to be president.

Iran

Iranian state TV focused on the nominees' take on Iran's nuclear issue. The IRINN rolling news channel highlighted Mrs Clinton's remark that US sanctions "brought Iran to the negotiation table" and Mr Trump denunciation of the nuclear deal as "one of the worst historical deals done between two countries".

Today Programme
BBC Radio 4