1998 Pepsi 400

The 1998 Pepsi 400 was a NASCAR Winston Cup Series stock car race held on October 17, 1998, at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida. Originally scheduled to be held on the Fourth of July, the race was postponed until the fall due to widespread wildfires in central Florida; it was the first superspeedway race to be held at night.

Contested over 160 laps, it was the thirtieth race of the 1998 season. Jeff Gordon of Hendrick Motorsports took his eleventh win of the season, while Bobby Labonte finished second and Mike Skinner finished third. Gordon retained his point lead on the way to his third Winston Cup championship title.

Daytona International Speedway is one of six superspeedways to hold NASCAR races, the others being Michigan International Speedway, California Speedway, Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Pocono Raceway and Talladega Superspeedway. The standard track at Daytona International Speedway is a four-turn superspeedway that is 2.5 miles (4.0 km) long. The track's turns are banked at 31 degrees, while the front stretch, the location of the finish line, is banked at 18 degrees. John Andretti was the defending race winner. The event was the fifth of five night races held during the 1998 Winston Cup Series season.

The 1998 Pepsi 400 was originally scheduled to be run on July 4, 1998, as the seventeenth race of the 33-event Winston Cup Series schedule. It was the first superspeedway race, and first NASCAR event held at Daytona, to be run at night following the installation of Musco lighting at the Daytona International Speedway; it was also scheduled to be broadcast live on CBS, the first stock car event to be televised live on primetime network television.

During the days leading up to the scheduled start of practice at 3pm, Thursday, July 2, 1998, concerns rose on account of the massive wildfire outbreak that was underway in central Florida; thousands of people were forced to evacuate the area, and Interstate 95, the primary north–south thoroughfare through the region, was closed. At 10am on July 2, NASCAR announced that the race was being postponed; while July 25 was an open date, the decision was made to reschedule the race for October 17, to allow additional time for the wildfires to be controlled. At the time of the postponement, the race was sold out; this was the first time the summer race at Daytona International Speedway had achieved sellout status.

The rescheduling meant that the race would not be televised on CBS, as the network did not want to compete against Fox's broadcast of Game 1 of the Major League Baseball World Series, also scheduled for October 17. On July 21, CBS Sports moved the race to their cable channel The Nashville Network, which would broadcast the rescheduled race live in its entirety. The race would be produced by World Sports Enterprises, which is also part of CBS Sports.

Prior to the race, Jeff Gordon led the Drivers' Championship with 4632 points, and Mark Martin was in second with 4344 points. Dale Jarrett was third in the Drivers' Championship with 4098 points, Rusty Wallace was fourth with 3883 points, and Jeff Burton was in fifth with 3805 points. In the Manufacturers' Championship, Chevrolet was tied with Ford for the lead with 216 points each; Pontiac followed in third with 138 points.

Practice and first round qualifying was held on Thursday, October 15, 1998; Bobby Labonte led pre-qualifying practice with a lap time of 46.722 seconds. Five Ford teams, those of drivers Chad Little, Jimmy Spencer, Rich Bickle, Dick Trickle and Billy Standridge, ran Thunderbird-bodied race cars, instead of the standard Taurus ran at most 1998 Winston Cup Series races, believing the Thunderbird to have an aerodynamic advantage at the restrictor plate racetracks. ARCA driver Randal Ritter's car failed to pass inspection due to extreme irregularities in its construction, and the team withdrew before practice began.