Meet Seth Barnett of Legendary Athletics in Scottsdale

Today we’d like to introduce you to Seth Barnett.

Seth, before we jump into specific questions about what you do, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
When I was fifteen years old, I had the opportunity to train at an athletic performance facility under Coach Tommy Byers at his facility: Elite Athletics. I am born and raised in a small town right outside of Baton Rouge, Louisiana– and anyone from the surrounding cities knew of Coach Tommy. He is, by far, one of the best coaches in the industry, not only for what he can do for athletic development in youth athletes but even more for the footprint he leaves in each of his athlete’s lives as far as what it means to be good people. As I played baseball in high school and into the collegiate level, still training with Coach Tommy, I became more and more interested in all of the “nerdy” aspects and details of what makes his program so good. This is ultimately what lead me to obtain by USA Weightlifting Sports Performance Certification at 18 years old.

After an unfortunate injury, my college baseball days were over and in turn, I transferred to Louisiana State University to study Kinesiology and Sports Administration and began coaching various sports.  Fast forward three years to December of 2014 and I moved to Phoenix, Arizona with the hopes of starting my own business in athletic development. While that didn’t go as planned, I am finally on the path where I’ve always wanted to be. Without being too long-winded, God has truly blessed me with a tremendous amount of opportunities and experiences (both good and bad) that have shaped and formed me, not only into the coach I am today but the man I am today as well. I have been fortunate enough to be surrounded by coaches that mentored me to take coaching to a deeper level, not just the typical “how strong and fast can we get an athlete?”. The taught me to ask: What makes the athlete tick?” “What’s the true “why” behind what we do?”  Not this rif raf of asking “what are your goals?” or only asking questions to close a sale. They taught me to meet the athlete at their level, to understand them as people first, and that’s when we can effectively coach and mentor them.

My business partner, Michael Santini, and I currently run our training program out of Scottsdale Combine, owned by Robert Gentile. Mike and I engaged in this partnership in May of 2019 and it has truly been a God-sent partnership. Mike owns KC Gripz and has a large baseball following due to the tried-and-true success of the product. It truly was a perfect fit. Fast forward another four months to this past summer where we sent off over 20 athletes to the collegiate or professional level, partnered with companies like KC Gripz, Jawku Speed, Thorne Research, Active Health Spine & Sport in Scottsdale, Vertimax, and are currently in the works with a few other companies on some groundbreaking things. We are excited about the future and definitely don’t plan on slowing down anytime soon.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
To say it’s been a smooth road would be a lie- which would be the case if you asked any entrepreneur. I initially moved to Arizona with a promise from someone to help open a facility.  Unfortunately, that turned out to be a sham. With no real backup plan, I began searching for jobs around the valley and found myself bouncing around to different facilities or gyms searching for my purpose. I spent the better part of four years trying to figure out what I wanted to do. I was around great people everywhere I went and had amazing clients but there was still an empty hole in my spirit that was constantly wanting more. This company and brand my more– this is what God put me on this Earth to do. I’m so grateful for all of the struggles and places I have been because it has been a learning experience every time and I would not know who I am without those experiences. If there is one thing I have learned, it is that regardless of what hits me hard in life, God always has my back. He always provides and if you keep pushing you’ll always come out the other side a survivor.

We’d love to hear more about your company?
What we do at Legendary Athletics is focus on explosive strength and speed development, working with athletes ranging from the 11-year-old athlete all the way up to the professional level in all sports. Overall athletic development takes priority over anything else in our program. We need our athletes to learn to develop power through the kinetic chain properly and be prepared for the unexpected in their field of play. A strong emphasis on technique and understanding in all bio-motor abilities takes top priority in what we do on a daily basis.

Specialization, in my opinion, has become something that has hindered true athletic development, which I believe, has played a huge role in the drastic increase in the amount of injuries year over year. We pride ourselves on taking what we see on the field in all sports and seeing how we can best apply it to the weight room and field for speed, while still focusing on developing the athlete as a whole, not just what they do for their specific sport. It is our job to develop the athlete’s power output, linear speed, and multi-directional speed. To put it simply, sport specificity is swinging a bat in the cage, practicing your jump shot, or running routes. That is the job of the skill coach, not ours.

In my opinion, Legendary Athletics is gaining traction and attention for its speed development program. We pride ourselves on technical efficiency. Like I said before, we put a huge emphasis on understanding how biomechanics and the nervous system work hand-in-hand as coaches. Too often we see coaches in this industry just doing things aimlessly without understanding arguably the two most important aspects to not only speed development, but also in the weight room: technical motor development and progressively overloading the nervous system the proper way. It is hard to manipulate these two things interchangeably, therefore, making it easy to screw up. We’ve already helped produce two 4.4 forty-yard dashes on the Jawku Speed Laser Timing System since May, and both were 18 years or younger. It isn’t uncommon for our athletes to see an average of .2-.4 tenths of a second drop in their 40 yard dash times in just one eight week training cycle.  One of our most recent successes was where one of our athletes dropped from a 4.72 to a 4.49 forty-yard dash time in only seven weeks.

Our motto is: Purpose. Precision. Elite. Mike and I go pedal-to-the-metal every single day. Every rep, every set, and every detail we demand the highest level of excellence. It’s not so much about “what we do” but how we do it. We understand our program isn’t for everyone and we are okay with that. We won’t compromise an ounce of integrity for a dollar bill. We are hard on our athletes because, quite frankly, life is hard. Mike and I get in the trenches with our athletes so they know that everything we demand of them is because we want them to be successful, not only on the field of play but when they also when they are forty-years-old with a family and kids and dominating the workforce. What we require of them physically is nothing compared to how we develop them mentally. Some people may disagree with this approach but one of my philosophies is: I want to find out what it will take to break you so we as coaches can then show you how to use that fear to your advantage. I would say that belief, and other is not only what we are proud of, but also what sets us apart.

Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
A desire to make sure every day we put our athletes first. It is not about us as coaches, it is about the athletes that trust us to help them reach their potential. Coaches play a huge role in shaping an athlete’s life. We will never, not even for a split second, take that privilege for granted.

Pricing:

• Explosive Strength and Speed Training (5 Day Option) — $600 monthly
• Explosive Strength Training Only (3 Day Option) — $420 monthly
• Speed Training Only (2 Day Option) — $320 monthly

Contact Info:

• Address: 7399 East Tierra Buena Lane, Scottsdale, Arizona, 85260
• Website: www.legendaryathleticsaz.com
• Phone: 225-278-2663
• Email: staff@legendaryathleticsaz.com

Image Credit:
Gordon Ly and Will Rudolph

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