Super featherweight Patrick Kinigamazi (31-2, 4 KOs) is not, by any stretch of the imagination, the hardest puncher in the world. But his boxing-skills, grit, determination and ring generalship makes him a very hard man to beat. Kinigamazi was born on March 2, 1983 in Rwanda, a troubled nation in Central Africa. At the age of fifteen, in 1998, he moved to Switzerland where most of his family lived and studied. He now lives in Thonex, not far from Geneva.

 

Kinigamazi's favorite sport is not boxing, but basketball. He actually prefers watching basketball and soccer ahead of boxing. But he got his start in combat sports at seventeen, doing karate, kung fu and eventually kickboxing, before also taking on traditional boxing.

 

As an amateur he represented the Club Pugilistique Carouge, trained by Giorgio Costantino who is still in his corner today. He turned professional in boxing in June of 2006. He quickly became the Swiss lightweight champion in 2007 but in between 2007 and 2010 he won European and World titles in full-contact kickboxing.

 

Things began to pick up for him in 2016. On April 22, 2016, Kinigamazi promoted his own fight against Miguel Alberto Gonzales Mena from Honduras. The bout was staged at a Citroën dealer in Geneva, with over 600 people in attendance, and Kinigamazi didn't pay himself a purse for the fight, which he won on points over eight rounds. A few months later, he got a big win, beating Spain-based Congolese Clark Telamanou. That fight took place in Carouge, Switzerland. He followed that up with a trip to France in which he defeated Ruben Gouveia (then 10-3-1). 

Kinigamazi has never boxed in Africa.

 

After that, Kinigamazi dropped down to 130 pounds, defeating four opponents with a combined record of 66-15-6: Juan Jose Farias was 18-9-1, Robert Laki 14-1-1, Ramiro Blanco 17-2-

3 and Jordan McCorry 17-3-1. This past June he stayed busy with a ten-round unanimous decision over Martin Parlagi (25-3-1) from the Czech Republic.