Billy's Bootcamp is an exercise program developed by

Billy Blanks William Wayne Blanks (born September 1, 1955) is an American fitness personality, martial artist, actor, and the creator of the Tae Bo exercise program. Early life and education Blanks was born in Erie, Pennsylvania. He began his study of t ...

. It created a pop culture phenomenon in Japan in 2007, much like

Tae Bo Tae Bo is a body fitness system that incorporates martial arts techniques, such as kicks and punches, which became popular in the 1990s. It was developed by American taekwondo practitioner Billy Blanks. Such programs use the motions of martial a ...

did in the U.S. earlier, selling more than 200,000 copies in May of the same year alone. Billy Blanks visited Japan on June 21, 2007 to promote Bootcamp. Upon arrival Blanks was greeted by 200 Japanese fans who affectionately call him "Taicho" ( ja, 隊長, chief) at

Narita International Airport Narita International Airport ( ja, 成田国際空港, Narita Kokusai Kūkō) , also known as Tokyo-Narita, formerly and originally known as , is one of two international airports serving the Greater Tokyo Area, the other one being Haneda Airport ...

. Blanks appeared on many Japanese TV shows during his ten-day stay in Japan such as

SMAP×SMAP ''SMAP×SMAP'', often referred to simply as ''Sma-Sma'', was a Japanese television variety show hosted by boy band SMAP. Debuting on April 15, 1996, it was produced by Kansai TV and Fuji TV and aired on Fuji TV every Monday from 10:00 p.m. t ...

where

Shingo Katori is a Japanese actor, singer, television host, radio personality. He was the youngest member of SMAP, one of the best-selling boy band in Asia. After the group's disbandment on 31 December 2016, Katori has been pursuing his solo career. He left ...

, a member of popular Japanese boy band

SMAP SMAP was a Japanese boy band, composed of Masahiro Nakai, Takuya Kimura, Goro Inagaki, Tsuyoshi Kusanagi, and Shingo Katori. The group was created in 1988 by music producer Johnny Kitagawa, founder of Johnny & Associates, originally as a six-pi ...

, impersonated Blanks. A tie-in video game based on the program, titled ''Billy's Bootcamp: Wii de Enjoy! Diet'' (ビリーズブートキャンプ Wiiでエンジョイダイエット！), was released in 2011 exclusively in Japan for the

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other Regional lockout, regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major ho ...

,「Fit Boxing」プレイヤー必見！　“中の人”に聞く，開発秘話と正しい運動法。プロによるレクチャー動画もあり
, 4Gamer.net, March 16, 2019 as the third and final installment of Rocket Company's '' Shape Boxing'' fitness game trilogy.

References

Physical exercise {{health-stub