In this episode, Dirk Friel talks with Alex Martin, a former professional motocross and supercross racer who spent over 15 years competing at the highest level, earning podiums and top-five finishes. After retiring from racing as a pro, Alex leaned into his passion for training and performance, co-founding Troll Training. His coaching company blends motocross performance with endurance sports methodologies.
Alex shares his journey from motocross to recently catching the “running bug” and how structured training, especially via TrainingPeaks, helped him transform his racing career and life after retirement. He just raced the 2025 Boston Marathon, finishing at 2:48:35, just shy of a PR, with plans to run several other big races in the coming months.
From building marathon fitness as a busy dad and coach to balancing strength, endurance, and recovery in high-risk motorsports, Alex shares an insider’s look at taking advantage of experience and science to advance the art of coaching unique athletes.
Standout Quotes
Structured Training Changed Motocross Career: “…when I started using TrainingPeaks and got a legit [coach], I had one of the best years of my career in 2016. I had the points lead after the second round and won a couple of races that year and finished second in the championship. And a lot of that was just from actually having structured training instead of just showing up to the track and being like, “I’m gonna ride for an hour today.””
“I think some people [who] are not familiar with the sport may just think you sit on [the bike]. But, I mean, for context, I would, you know, throughout my career, train 15 to 20 hours a week, and I never once came off the track and wasn’t exhausted.”
The True Demands of Motocross
The ‘Running Bug’ and New Training Goals: “Honestly, I just I love running. So I have two kids now. My wife and I, we have two two under two. So it’s been quite a busy last couple years. But I was like, I don’t wanna, like, bike for three or four hours a day, you know? And so for me, running was, like, bang for my buck time wise. I can go out and get a pretty good workout running for an hour. And I decided to sign up for the LA marathon a couple years ago, and I kinda just got the bug the running bug with marathons.
Developing Coaching Methodologies : “The tricky part is, and I think people are still figuring [training] out in our sport, is like, how do you program strength, the fast switch intervals, and [still] be fresh on the dirt bike? Because if you’re not fresh on the dirt bike, that chance of injury is so high. And so I kinda just adopted, like, a lot of volume and tried to keep the heart rate low and build that aerobic foundation. And then the intensity came on the dirt bike.”
“I didn’t qualify for Boston my first year, but I was able to last year and I made it this year to Boston. So that was, that was a wild experience. I’ve never ran with that many people before. That was crazy.”
Training for and Racing marathons
Alex Martin Online
Troll Training
Troll Training on TrainingPeaks
Troll Training Instagram
Troll Training YouTube
