A noted brawler in Hong Kong, Lee received formal training in wing chun under legendary sifu Yip Man. He later trained in a variety of arts before creating his Jeet Kune Do style.
According to Hong Kong stuntman Phillip Ko, Lee was challenged by a tiger/crane kung fu stylist, an extra on Enter the Dragon (1973), who claimed Lee was a phony. Lee, who was furious at the claim, accepted the challenge to prove that his martial arts were indeed the real deal. The fight, which took place on the film set, only lasted 30 seconds, with Bruce pummeling his challenger with a series of straight punches to the face, low-line kicks to his shins/knees/thighs and finally ended with the guy being smashed to the wall with his hair pulled and his arms trapped by Bruce. After Lee forced the kung fu stylist to submit, he showed some class by telling him to go back to work instead of firing him. This fight was witnessed by the film's producer, Fred Weintraub, and Robert Wall.
Adopted his legendary nunchaku routine in his movies from the legendary karate master Hidehiko "Hidy" Ochiai. The two met at the Los Angeles YMCA in the mid 1960s.
Alongside Muhammad Ali, Lee is cited as a major influence by many K-1 and MMA champions: Bas Rutten, Jose "Pele' Landi-Jons, Wanderlei Silva, 'Emilianenko Fedor', Norifumi "Kid' Yamamoto, Rob Kaman, Ramon Dekkers, Frank Shamrock, Murilo Rua, Mauricio Rua, 'Jerome Le Banner', 'Carlos Newton', Remy Bonjasky, Jeremy Horn, David Loiseau and Tito Ortiz, among others.
Before hitting it big as a movie star, he often trained with the martial arts world's biggest stars, many of whom would latter become celebrities in their own right, such as world karate champion 'Chuck Norris'. Despite rumors and reports to the contrary, Lee was never Norris' instructor. They trained together, often trading techniques and ideas, but never had a student-teacher relationship.
Bruce Lee Jun Fan Yuen Kam (Bruce Lee's full birth name) was born in the year of the dragon (1940), at the hour of the dragon (between 6:00AM- 8:00AM).
Chosen by Goldsea Asian American Daily as one of the "100 Most Inspiring Asian Americans of All Time". (ranked #2).
Defeated British boxer Gary Elms by knockout in the third round in the 1958 Hong Kong amateur boxing championships by using Wing Chun traps and high/low-level straight punches. Before he met Elms in the finals, he knocked out three boxers in the first round. Hawkings Cheung, his fellow Wing Chun street fighter, witnessed the event.
Demand for his private lessons grew so high, his hourly rate soared to $275 per hour.
Developed a trick for showing off his speed: a person held a coin and closed his hand, and as he closed it, Lee would take it and could even swap the coin for another.
Developed his martial art style called Jeet Kune Do (Way of the Intercepting Fist) which is more of an idea of being flexible and practical with learning martial arts
Died of brain edema in Hong Kong at age 32.
Earned $30,000 for his first two feature films.
Faced discrimination from other Chinese kung fu masters when trying to learn other martial arts styles. Would usually go to the number 3 or 4 man in a certain system to learn it in exchange for teaching what he knew.
Father of Brandon Lee and Shannon Lee.
Had four siblings, two sisters and two brothers: Phoebe Lee (b. 1938), Agnes Lee, older brother and fencing champion Peter Lee, and younger brother and musician Robert Lee. Some sources claim he also had a brother James who died of Black Lung in 1972, but James Yimm Lee was in fact his training partner, and not his brother.
Has a statue placed in the country Bosnia. After many years of war and religious splits, Lee's figure is to commend his work, to successfully bridge culture gaps in the world (2004 September).
He is considered the greatest martial artist of the 20th century.
He was a gang leader in his teenage years. The name of his group was known as "The Tigers of Junction Street".
His ancestry is German and Chinese. His father is a full-blooded Chinese, while his mother is of German-Chinese decent (her father is German; her mother is Chinese).