Danish podcast Veloropa did a special om Mads Pedersen the other day, and a couple of fun anecdotes came out of it.
One of the participants recalled Mads Pedersen as a junior rider:
He'd shown up at a senior elite road race in Copenhagen, having ridden his road bike the 65 k from his parents house to race start, wearing a backpack with a change of clothes.
He put down the backpack, started the race, smashed everyone and won the race - then put his backpack back on, went on the podium to collect his prize (which he put in the backpack) - then got on his bike and rode the 65 k home again.
The other one was when he, as a 20 year old, rode for PC team Stölting Group.
As part of his training, he rode a danish elite road race, with one of his old buddies.
The buddy had always dreamed of winning an elite race, but wasn't quite good enough.
So Mads Pedersen told him to ride away from the peloton on his own early - then attacked himself and rode up to his friend, told him to sit on his wheel, and then spent 120 k ferrying him to the finish line, while keeping the entire peloton at bay, without the friend taking the lead a single time, and delivered him to the line, where Mads Pedersen backed off and let him creep across the line first, for the only win of the friends career.