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Actor And Martial Artist Chuck Norris Is 80 Today

Actor And Martial Artist Chuck Norris Is 80 Today

He's still so hard he makes onions cry

Jake Massey

Jake Massey

The actor and martial artist Chuck Norris is 80 years old today - which is pretty hard to believe.

Chuck Norris is 80 today.
PA

Born Carlos Ray Norris, he earned the nickname Chuck while serving in the Air Force as an 18-year-old.

From there, he became an expert in various martial arts and began training celebrities in Hollywood, with his big break coming when Bruce Lee invited him to play a villain in the 1972 film The Way of the Dragon.

This was the first of countless fighting roles for Norris and over the decades he has earned himself a reputation as the toughest man in the showbiz world - or indeed the whole world.

Thanks to this reputation, he became the subject of endless memes in the mid-noughties, and the man himself even got involved, as you can see below:

Tributes to the star have been flooding in on social media, and inevitably, almost all of them include a classic Norris gag - you know, 'Chuck Norris doesn't celebrate birthdays, birthdays celebrate him', etc. Here's a selection of highlights:

But while it is easy - and fun - to pigeonhole Norris as a hard man, there's actually a lot more to him than that.

He has written books on a vast range of subjects, from martial arts and exercise, to politics and religion. He has established two martial arts charities and has been the subject of various games, most recently the 2017 video game Nonstop Chuck Norris.

He also remains the only person to ever defeat a brick wall at a game of tennis*.

*Rumour has it.

Happy birthday, Chuck.

Featured Image Credit: PA

Topics: Celebrity, US Entertainment