‘EXCITE’ is the key word for boxing trainer and co-promoter of Fight Town 1 Paddy Fitzpatrick ahead of the show’s inaugural event on April 27.

Fitzpatrick, who is teaming up with Mark Neilson and Trifecta, will have several fighters on the bill including Luke Watkins, Sam Smith and Ryan Martin and has high hopes of seeing victories for each one.

As a man who literally wears many hats, this show will test Fitzpatrick’s ability to dabble in different areas of a boxing show, from trainer to co-promoter to general fan of the sport.

The 50-year-old is very much looking forward to testing himself in the various capacities and holds a great deal of optimism for the first in what he hopes will be a long series of boxing events in Swindon.

Fitzpatrick said: “As a trainer, I’ve got seven fighters in this show and they’re all exciting.

“As a co-promoter, every fight on the card excites me.

“It also excites me that we’re bringing such a big show to Swindon – we’ve got 17 professional fights on the card, so it’s a big show, with a ten-rounder and an eight-rounder heading it up.

“It excites me that we’re delivering bigger shows than people are used to seeing here and it excites me that the Swindon public has got behind it so much.”

One of the headline fighters, and a Fitzpatrick-trained fighter, Luke ‘The Duke’ Watkins is due to be a headline bout on the card against an as yet unnamed opponent.

Despite coming off the back of two high-profile losses to Isaac Chamberlain and Lawrence Okolie last year, Fitzpatrick defended his man and called for a degree of perspective when judging Watkins’ achievements so far.

He said: “Luke has already proved he is at a certain level – he’s been the Irish champion, the Commonwealth champion.

“He only had 15 amateur fights, that was his experience, that’s all he had. All his experience comes from being with me.

“He’s been training with me for ten years and he’s experienced in the pros, travelling around and sparring guys out in Poland and sparring with the top guys back here.

“I expect the best for Luke, I think Luke is world class and it’s harder when you don’t have the big promoters behind you, to negate the field and get the big fights.

“But we’ve proved already – we got ‘Duke’ in for a Commonwealth title shot before a lot of the big promoters had their men in there – people who had the same records as ‘Duke’.

“So long as we work hard and we keep our eyes open, we’ll see when openings come to be able to move forward.”