(from a conversation on Facebook about Mr. Parker breaking boards for a commercial promoting the International Karate Championships, see commercial here: https://kenponotes.blogspot.com/2016/09/ed-parker-breaking-boards.html )
The back story was, that Mr. Parker felt breaking boards was a useless activity and hated doing this publicity stunt to advertise the tournament. But just like adding the word "karate" back to the modern system, he gave the public what they wanted. He bruised both of his hands pretty good and his knuckles were really swollen afterward.
I remember that day vividly because his hands were visibly banged up, red, and swollen, so I asked because I worked and wasn't at the shoot. He wasn't happy about having to do it at all. But, he wouldn't let on to anybody he bruised his hands. It had probably been many decades since he broke a board. In his famous first commercial, he opened by breaking one board with a single punch and said, "Ever been attacked by a tree? Probably not." Breaking boards when we were Chinese Kenpo didn't make sense and led to one of Mr. Parker's sayings, "Always hit hard with soft, and soft with hard." Simply, Heel palm strikes to the head, punches to the body. Besides, despite the publicity garnered from board breaking, Mr. Parker thought the makiwara was stupid, and most never used it as intended. If you strike with the palm down, that is anatomically after the punch into its extension. The Chinese rightly focus on what we call the vertical punch, which then may be extended into the horizontal position as follow-through. Driving your hand into a makiwara in the horizontal position Mr. Parker called "jousting." He complained about the officials in tournaments who allowed points for doing the same thing. He said, "That's not punching. Points shouldn't be allowed for jousting."
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