Marco Pantani of Mercatone Uno–Bianchi won the overall general classification, with Team Telekom's Jan Ullrich, the defending champion, and Cofidis rider Bobby Julich finishing on the podium in second and third respectively.

The day after, the yellow jersey switched to another rider from the same breakaway, Boardman's teammate Stuart O'Grady, who took vital seconds from time bonuses gained in intermediate sprints.

[1] The first round of squads that were invited were the first sixteen teams in the ranking system of the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI), cycling's governing body, on 1 January 1998, provided that they were still in the top twenty after transfers were factored into the calculation.

[22] The team was further strengthened by the arrival of Alex Zülle in the 1998 season, winner of the two previous editions of the three-week Grand Tour of Spain, the Vuelta a España, who was considered to be a competitor for overall victory in his own right.

[29] When the Tour's route was announced in October 1997, Pantani expressed dissatisfaction with the number of time trials and the fact that the race featured only two mountain-top finishes.

His decision to ride the Tour was not made until Luciano Pezzi, his closest confidant and an important figure at Mercatone Uno, died suddenly in late June.

[28] The final rider noted as a leading contender, named "the outsider", was the ONCE team leader Laurent Jalabert, a complete all-rounder who excelled in all road cycling disciplines.

[43] The 1998 Tour was pushed back one week from its original start date, so as not to overlap too much with the 1998 FIFA World Cup, also held in France, which ended on 12 July, one day after the prologue.

[56] On 4 March 1998, a truck belonging to the Dutch TVM–Farm Frites team was seized by customs officers in Reims, France, revealing 104 vials of recombinant erythropoietin (EPO), a drug with performance-enhancing effects.

[60][61] During the Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré, a race held two weeks before the start of the Tour, Christophe Moreau of Festina tested positive for the anabolic steroid mesterolone.

[62] The UCI accepted Festina's explanation that the positive test was a result of the influence of a team masseur, and Moreau was allowed to start the Tour de France.

[63] Three days before the start of the Tour, on 8 July, Willy Voet, a soigneur (team assistant) with the Festina squad, was stopped by customs officers driving along a back road on the Franco–Belgian border.

[72][76] Unlike other general classification favourites, who always rode at the front of the peloton (main group), Pantani spent the first days of the Tour at the back, surrounded by his teammates.

[83] Team Telekom's Jens Heppner won stage 3 from a two-rider sprint with Xavier Jan of Française des Jeux, after the pair had escaped late from a nine-rider breakaway.

[66] Before the start of stage 5,[93] Jean-Marie Leblanc announced at a press conference that the professional licences held by Roussel and Rijkaert had been provisionally suspended by the UCI.

[97] Temperatures increased to a high of 44 °C (111 °F) during the following stage, which was won by Rabobank rider Léon van Bon in a final sprint, contested between a four-man breakaway.

Close to the top, Pantani launched a successful attack and summitted with an advantage of 42 seconds, but was unable to catch the soloing Massi on the descent,[104] who took the stage victory as well as the lead of the mountains classification.

The peloton agreed not to begin racing until after the first 45 km (28 mi), when they stopped to pay their respects at the memorial to Fabio Casartelli on the Col de Portet d'Aspet, who crashed and died there during the 1995 Tour.

[112] As the riders lined up with their bikes at the start of the stage, Jalabert broadcast a statement on their behalf on the race's official station, Radio Tour, saying "We are fed up with being treated like cattle.

[113] The instigators of the strike were Jalabert, Blijlevens, Max Sciandri (Française des Jeux), and Prudencio Induráin (Vitalicio Seguros) as well as ONCE's team manager Manolo Saiz.

[115] After about 40 km (25 mi), Jalabert then went on the attack over a short climb with his brother Nicolas (Cofidis) and Bart Voskamp (TVM),[116] with the group building up a lead of about five minutes.

[124] On the Croix de Fer, Massi bridged over to a breakaway group and scored maximum points for the mountains classification, a feat he repeated on the second climb of the day, the Col du Télégraphe.

[125] After the short descent of the Télégraphe, the race reached the Galibier, where Riis cracked following his work reeling back attackers, leaving Ullrich without a teammate.

[132] Before stage 18 into Neuchâtel in Switzerland, police held Massi, who was still the leader in the mountains classification, for questioning after corticoids were allegedly found in his room during a search of the Casino team hotel.

[136] The final stage on the Champs-Élysées in Paris was won by Steels from a bunch sprint, while Pantani finished safely in the peloton to secure the Tour win.

[156][157][158] Following Festina's expulsion from the race, the police investigation against the TVM team in March was made public by Le Parisien and the case reopened.

[174] Police called in twelve riders from BigMat for questioning along with the directeur sportif and some soigneurs a week after the end of the Tour because of "330 bottles and ampoules of drugs" found in the team's truck.

The squad then competed in the last Grand Tour of the year, the Vuelta a España,[214] where Alex Zülle failed to defend his title, but won a stage and finished eighth overall.

[216] This did not come to pass however, as the average speed rose again[216] and race winner Lance Armstrong was stripped of his title in 2012 following a lengthy investigation into doping practises.

[219] The Tour de France scandal highlighted the need for an independent international agency that would set harmonized standards for anti-doping work and coordinate the efforts of sports organizations and public authorities.