Billy Wayne Blanks is an American fitness guru, martial artist, actor, and the creator of the Tae Bo exercise program. Blanks began his study of the martial arts at the age of eleven, attending Karate and Taekwondo classes. He was born with an anomal...

Billy Wayne Blanks is an American fitness guru, martial artist, actor, and the creator of the Tae Bo exercise program. Blanks began his study of the martial arts at the age of eleven, attending Karate and Taekwondo classes. He was born with an anomaly in his hip joints that impaired his movement. The resulting clumsiness caused taunts from Blanks' siblings and led his instructors to believe that he would never accomplish much. Blanks found the answer to these challenges in karate. When he saw Bruce Lee on TV, he decided he wanted to be a world martial-arts champion, which helped counter the hip anomaly.