He is the sixth of seven Italians, after Ottavio Bottecchia, Gino Bartali, Fausto Coppi, Gastone Nencini and Felice Gimondi, and before Vincenzo Nibali to win the Tour de France.

The narrative was cultivated by Pantani, who picked the nickname "Il Pirata" (English: "The Pirate") because of his shaven head and the bandana and earrings he wore.

[13] He ultimately finished the race behind Eugeni Berzin but ahead of Miguel Induráin, who had won the two previous Giros.

That same year Pantani made his Tour de France debut, coming in third and winning the young rider classification along the way.

In 1995, he was hit by a car while training, preventing him from riding the Giro, but he rode the Tour and won stages at Alpe d'Huez and Guzet-Neige.

He also won a stage at the Tour de Suisse and finished third in the 1995 World Championships road race in Duitama, Colombia, behind Spaniards Abraham Olano and Miguel Induráin.

Shortly after returning to Italy, he collided head-on with a car during the Italian Milano–Torino race, sustaining multiple fractures to the left tibia and fibula,[14] injuries that threatened his career and forced him to miss most of the 1996 season.

Luciano Pezzi founded Mercatone Uno, taking with him as directeur sportifs Giuseppe Martinelli, Davide Cassani and Alessandro Giannelli and ten of the riders from Carrera.

In the seventeenth stage to Selva di Val Gardena, Pantani took the maglia rosa, the leader's jersey, for the first time in his career after attacking Zülle on the Marmolada climb.

[22] In the following stage to Alpe di Pampeago, he finished second behind Tonkov but maintained the general classification lead over him and gained further time on Zülle and Guerini.

Although the hematocrit test is officially branded as a "health check", a high reading suggests that a rider may have been blood doping with EPO.

[31][32] At the time of his disqualification, Pantani had won four stages and held a comfortable lead of five minutes and thirty-eight seconds over Paolo Savoldelli and also led in the points and mountains classifications.

On the next stage, which featured the hors catégorie Col de Joux-Plane to Morzine, Pantani broke away with 120 km to go, trying to crush Armstrong, but he suffered stomach problems and withdrew the next day.

[39][40] After being released from the clinic, he was acquitted of a pending court case for sporting fraud regarding his blood values in 1999 Giro d'Italia because doping was not considered a crime in 1999.

[42] The trial for the 1999 Giro d'Italia irregular blood values began in April 2003 and Pantani was eventually acquitted because doping was not considered a crime by the law at that time.

[44][45][46] Although the results did not surface until 1999, the UCI had decided to implement blood testing in early 1997, imposing a 50-per cent upper limit for hematocrit.

Upon Guariniello's request to see Pantani's medical record after his accident at the 1997 Giro d'Italia, it was revealed that the blood test results had disappeared from the folder at the hospital and the police did not rule out "intentional removal".

[52] Although he initially received a three-month suspended sentence,[53] Pantani's lawyers appealed and the case was dismissed in late 2001 because the law itself had been passed only in 1999.

According to the information released by the newspaper, Francesco Conconi administered EPO to Italian athletes from 1993 to 1998, including Pantani and other cyclists of Carrera.

[56][57] It was revealed that Pantani's name appeared on a file marked "Dblab", seized from Conconi's Biomedical Research Institute at Ferrara, which detailed athlete's hematocrit levels between 1993 and 1995.

In March 1995, his hematocrit values had dropped to 45%, but they reached 56% in July during the Tour de France, where he won two stages; and over 60% in October, after the accident in the Milano–Torino.

According to documentation released by Spanish radio network Cadena SER, Pantani was allegedly given the code name "PTNI" by Eufemiano Fuentes, with a detailed program in 2003, his last season, including EPO, growth hormone, Insulin, Levothroid and IGF-1.

[66] In 2006, Jesús Manzano, a Spanish professional road racing cyclist whose statements led the Guardia Civil to conduct the Operación Puerto investigation, disclosed in an interview with French television channel France 3 that Pantani was a client of Fuentes.

[67] On the penultimate stage of 1998 Giro d'Italia, Pantani's teammate Riccardo Forconi was expelled from the race for an haematocrit value above 50 per cent.

The conviction was overturned in 2011 by the Court of Cassation after the acting Prosecutor expressed doubts regarding the verdict, while stating that he "had the impression that the exaggerated media publicity surrounding Mr. Pantani's death led the judges to an excessive attribution of responsibility.

"[77] In 2016 the case was opened again,[78] but shelved, and then yet again; with Italian prosecutors citing about fifty pages of new evidence to consider, in November 2021.

Twenty thousand mourners were at his funeral, which was attended by Franco Ballerini, Alberto Tomba, Azeglio Vicini, Mario Cipollini and Diego Maradona among others.

[14][81]Miguel Induráin, five-times Tour de France winner, praised Pantani by saying: "He got people hooked on the sport.

Biographies and accounts on the life of Pantani have been written by sports journalists John Wilcockson and Matt Rendell, among others.

[89] A number of monuments and memorials have been erected in his honor at, among other places, Mortirolo Pass,[90] Colle Fauniera,[91] Col du Galibier,[92] and his hometown Cesenatico.