Personal sponsorship deals lift Mads Pedersen into top ten highest paid pro riders

A recent legal hearing has revealed details of Mads Pedersen's financial value, with Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet estimating that the Lidl-Trek rider earns over €3 million per year, putting him in the top ten highest pro riders in the peloton.

Pedersen is one of twelve Danish athletes who filed a lawsuit against HBO Nordic over alleged image misuse. They claimed that HBO Nordic used images of them without consent to promote its own products and subscriptions ahead of the 2024 Olympic Games. HBO Nordic disputed the claims, arguing that the images were used in an editorial context rather than commercial.

The case led to the publication of several of Pedersen's personal sponsorship deals. He had a two-year deal with safety footwear brand Airtox said to be worth €228,000 per year and a new partnership with Lidl sport clothing brand Crivit, which he said would be worth more than €456,000 annually for five years. Pedersen signed a signed a lifetime 'forever' contract with Lidl-Trek in May 2025.

“This is the single biggest source of income from my profession as a cyclist. It’s what puts food on the table,” Pedersen said during the case.  

Ekstra Bladet combined Pedersen's personal deals with his reported salary of between €2.5 and €3 million from Lidl-Trek, as revealed by La Gazzetta dello Sport. The Danish newspaper thus suggested that Pedersen's total earnings were between €3 and €3.5 million.

Pedersen is one of the big-name Classics contenders in the peloton and won a stage and the green points jersey at the 2026 Tour de France. He is admired for his aggressive style of racing and straight talking.

According to La Gazzetta, Tadej Pogacar is the highest paid rider in the pro peloton, earning around €8.4 million per year from UAE Team Emirates-XRG, plus €2.5 million per year from personal sponsorship and merchandising.

Remco Evenepoel is second on the list, reportedly earning close to €6 million per year, followed by Jonas Vingegaard (€5 million) and Mathieu van der Poel. Paul Seixas is expected to climb the top ten when he agrees his new contract for beyond 2027.

Analysis carried out for Ekstra Bladet suggested Pedersen was the third best Danish athlete based on commercial potential, behind Vingegaard and tennis player Holger Rune, but ahead of footballer Rasmus Højlund. Pedersen moved up from fifth place in 2025 to third place in 2026.

The score is based on the number of Instagram followers, media coverage, the prestige of the sport, international reach and other factors.

"He has a commercially strong profile. He delivers the results, and he also speaks to a fairly large target group," Thomas Badura of the branding experts Above Sports told Ekstra Bladet.

"There is no doubt that he is one of the athletes who attracts a lot of attention and interest, and I would definitely say that he is one of the heavyweights in our country."