Billy Blanks, the innovative fitness guru isn’t letting age slow him down. He’s best known for creating the Tae Bo workouts in the 1970s and at age 69 he’s still teaching his full body workout classes.
While he continues to be very present in the gym and online, it seems some fans have lost touch with Blanks overtime. On July 7, one of his solo fitness videos was shared on The Shade Room’s Instagram in a two-slide post, and the instructor received some shocking reactions to his current appearance since rising to fame in the late ’90s. Blanks sported normal fitness attire in the video which included a lavender muscle shirt, gym shorts, and white sneakers.
Blanks, sporting a lavender muscle shirt, gym shorts, and white sneakers, moved his body and arms from side to side in the silenced video, while slowly squatting down in a wide-legged position. Holding the squat form, Blanks then moved his arms up into a curled position, flexing his muscles as he lowered the top half of his body from side to side, and squeezing his lower abdomen. In the next slide, Blanks kept his legs spread apart as he did uppercut movements with each arm. He transitioned from that move to doing regular forward punches before the clip abruptly ends.
For some fans, Blanks’ video took them back down memory lane, and they couldn’t believe how he looks for his age.
One fan commented, “That man finna be 70 and still in great shape. Get it Bill!!”
A second wrote, “He looks great wow remember him as a kid (80s baby).”
Others had a different opinion about how Blanks has transformed over the years.
One person said, “Well he need to stop He don’t look fit anymore. He got a belly.”
Another joked, “He maybe eating too many steaks.”
A third wrote, “Billy got that pop belly now.”
According to several reports, as a child Blanks had an impairment in his hip joints that affected his movements. He found his strength in karate at a young age and earned a black belt at age 16, according to The Philadelphia Tribune. He went on to earn other black belts in five other martial art forms and was also on the U.S. karate team, earning 36 gold medals in international competition.
Blanks got his start as a fitness guru when he moved to Los Angeles in the late 1980s to open a studio. He began with a facility he opened in 1989 in the Sherman Oaks neighborhood, where he was teaching women self-protection.
“I knew a lot of women liked to do aerobics, so when I started adding karate and boxing and different kinds of aesthetics to it, a little bit of weight training, it gave women the opportunity to feel like they could do it without ever putting on a karate uniform,” he told People magazine last year.
His signature hybrid workouts he dubbed Tae Bo are a mix between martial arts and dancing. Eventually he gained some traction, and even celebrities joined his classes. But he had trouble selling his videos. One production team didn’t go for his videos because they didn’t believe white women would want to work with him. He ultimately was able to reach a successful deal with producer Paul Monea. Together they began marketing Blanks’ course in infomercials that eventually generated millions in revenue before the two parted ways due to Monae’s bad business practices and piling lawsuits.
Blanks’ celebrity as a fitness instructor opened the door to acting roles. Eventually, he went on to star in movies like “Bloodfist,” and “Kiss the Girls” and made appearances in shows like “The Parkers” and “Sabrina the Teenage Witch.”
As Blanks described to People, to this day he is driven to remain active in the instruction space.
“I like what I do and I love to see people smile,” he told the magazine. “I like to see people reach their goals and do things they never thought they could do.”
