Tae Bo No More?

Remember the late 90s exercise craze Tae Bo? It appears to have gone the way of the thighmaster and Jazzercise, as Tae Bo originator Billy Blanks quietly closed his Tae Bo World Training Center on Ventura Blvd. last month.

I say "quietly" because I can't find any news article on it while searching Google; the only thing I did find was this post from a sad Tae Bo fan on the Daily News' ValleyNews website.

The fan gets misty-eyed as she writes about the final day of tae-bo-ing (is that a verb) at the Tae Bo headquarters Nov. 19:

Lots of sweat. Lots of tears. Lots of cheering and laughing and hugging through the sweat and tears. That was the scene on Sunday, Nov. 19 at the closing of the Billy Blanks TaeBo® World Training Center. When I showed up for the last 10:30 a.m. class on Sunday, a line of more than 100 people snaked around the cars in the over crowded parking lot. Another hundred or so people were already inside on the floor waiting for Billy to begin his last class.

I tried calling the Tae Bo center, but a message only said that "this line will remain open for future information."

I suppose people (beyond those Tae Bo die-hards) moved on to the next thing, such as spinning. Farewell, tae bo. I'm not sure exactly what you were, but I'm sure you made Billy Blanks lots of money.