Doping at the 1998 Tour de France been using EPO in the 1998 Tour de France. A number, which came on top of the additional 9 out of 9 Festina riders and 2 out of 9 TVM riders, who already had confessed EPO abuse due to their implication in the prior police investigations. Among the riders who were never tested for EPO abuse, the following never-the-less later on confessed also having doped with EPO in preparation/during the 1998 Tour de France: Chris Boardman was the only rider to wear the yellow jersey in 1998 who has not been accused of doping. Of the top ten riders to
1924 Tour de France of 3 minutes made the margin 35 minutes. In each stage, all cyclists started together. The cyclist who reached the finish first, was the winner of the stage. The time that each cyclist required to finish the stage was recorded. For the general classification, these times were added up; the cyclist with the least accumulated time (after compensating for time bonuses and/or time penalties) was the race leader, identified by the yellow jersey. Bottecchia became the first Italian cyclist who won the Tour de France, and the first cyclist to wear the yellow jersey from the start to the end