St. Paul’s Boxing Club – Fundraising Show
By Thomas Conway
St. Paul’s Boxing Club is beginning the build-up to its biggest ever fundraising show, and coach Brian Carr says the club will “leave no stone unturned” to make it the best event the Nenagh-based outfit has ever staged.
Scheduled for Friday, January 29th, 2027, in the Abbey Court Hotel Nenagh, the night will consist of a selection of fights, possibly up to fifteen, featuring both experienced and former boxers as well as rookie fighters who have no previous experience in the ring. The club is appealing for potential participants in the latter category and encouraging anyone to put their name forward. The first-time boxers will undergo an intense six to eight week training camp to prepare them for the event, in which they will square off against an opponent of a similar ability, weight, size and fitness level.
For more than eighteen months, Brian and others involved in St. Paul’s have been searching relentlessly for a new home for the club, which continues to operate out of a premises just off Kenyon Street, although their tenancy is coming to an end. There is now hope on the horizon. Brian says that a number of potential premises have been identified as suitable for the club to relocate to. However, they may have to undergo an upgrade first, and that could prove costly.
“People will know the club is looking for new premises,” Brian explains.
“And we’re after coming across a couple of them, but it’s going to cost us a pretty penny to renovate one, so this is why we’re running the show.”
The main aim of the show is to raise funds to finance such a renovation, but Brian also believes the event will give people who have never boxed before an opportunity to experience the sport and its benefits. He is on the lookout for potential fighters, and he says he wants to get as many people to put their name forward as possible.
He is hopeful that some of the other local sporting organisations – such as local GAA, soccer, and rugby clubs – will support St. Paul’s and possibly encourage their players to put their names forward.
Brian, who has been involved in pre-season training with many of those same clubs, predicts that it will be a memorable night for both the boxers and the spectators.
“It’s going to be the biggest show we’ve ever run,” he says.
“We have the wedding function room booked in the Abbey Court, with seats for 250 people in it. We have the bar. A DJ will be there with music. It’s going to be a big night.”
The club is booming
Brian also says there has been an increase in the membership base of St. Paul’s, which is now in the region of sixty to seventy people. He emphasises that a huge amount of older people are now availing of the club’s fitness classes, while the senior section is consistently producing good, competitive boxers. However, it is the junior section that is really thriving.
“The future is bright, the club is booming,” he says.
“We’ve lots of good boxers who are competing. We’ve got a booming junior class and we have some serious stars of the future coming up through the ranks, some really, really talented kids.”
There were plans that Brian himself would box on the night, and he was enthusiastic to do so, but due to a lack of availability of opponents, that probably isn’t going to materialise. His full focus, along with others in the club, is on bringing this fundraiser to fruition and securing St. Paul’s a new home. “We’ll definitely have somewhere to go,” Carr concludes.