{"id":64829,"date":"2026-08-04T08:52:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T08:52:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/64829\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T08:52:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T08:52:22","slug":"professional-muay-thai-fighter-protects-women-from-road-rage-driver-on-sunshine-coast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/64829\/","title":{"rendered":"Professional Muay Thai fighter protects women from road rage driver on Sunshine Coast"},"content":{"rendered":"

An enraged driver has been left red-faced after a road rage confrontation was broken up by a professional fighter on a Queensland<\/a> highway.<\/p>\n

Brisbane<\/a>-based professional Muay Thai fighter Ryan McDonald was heading home from a camping trip in Noosa<\/a> with friends on Sunday when he witnessed two women being threatened by a man in a white van on the Bruce Highway. <\/p>\n

WATCH VIDEO ABOVE: Professional fighter steps in to help young women caught in road rage incident<\/p>\n

Know the news with the 7NEWS app: Download today Arrow<\/a><\/p>\n

McDonald, 19, said he saw a young woman try to merge multiple times into the left lane, but a white van continued to block her. <\/p>\n

As the woman approached a build-up of traffic, the van driver cut in front of her, before jumping out and attempting to open her driver\u2019s side door. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe jumped out of the car in the middle of the highway, and there are these two girls on their own in the car,\u201d McDonald said. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was thinking this would be a good opportunity to help, to use what I know and help these girls, and to try and de-escalate the situation.\u201d<\/p>\n

McDonald said he instinctively exited his own car and asked the man what he was doing.<\/p>\n

\"RyanRyan McDonald was driving home from a camping trip with friends when he saw the road rage incident unfold. Credit: 7NEWS\"TheThe van driver attempted to open the driver\u2019s side door of the women\u2019s car. Credit: Supplied<\/p>\n

\u201cThe man instantly tried to start a fight. I told him \u2018get back in your van\u2019 … and he took his shirt off,\u201d McDonald said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe guy said, \u2018You sure you want this?\u2019 and I said, \u2018Yeah, yeah I do\u2019. He said I didn\u2019t know who I was messing with.\u201d <\/p>\n

As it turned out, the van driver was the one unaware he was facing off against a professional fighter with eight career victories, four of those knockouts. <\/p>\n

\"RyanRyan McDonald is a\u00a0professional Muay Thai fighter based in Brisbane. Credit: 7NEWS<\/p>\n

\u201cI was pretty calm the whole time. I didn\u2019t try and pose a threat or make myself look big (but) he was trying to be threatening,\u201d McDonald said. <\/p>\n

Other motorists came to assist, one even recognising McDonald from his online presence before telling the van driver he was about to engage in a fight with a professional.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe (van driver) said \u2018show me how professional you are then\u2019,\u201d McDonald said. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe told me I couldn\u2019t fight outside the gym or it would ruin my reputation. Well, I think he\u2019s made a pretty good reputation for himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"TheThe van driver eventually backed down when he realised he was facing off against a professional fighter. Credit: Supplied<\/p>\n

The van driver eventually backed down and got back in his car. <\/p>\n

The incident was caught on dashcam and posted to social media, where it has racked up almost two million views and an outpouring of support for McDonald.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was the best possible outcome, just de-escalating the situation. Everyone got home safe that day,\u201d McDonald said. <\/p>\n

Police confirmed no charges have been laid over the incident. <\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An enraged driver has been left red-faced after a road rage confrontation was broken up by a professional…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64830,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21,99,312,227,152,229,230,595,1076],"class_list":["post-64829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-brisbane","tag-crime","tag-lifestyle","tag-news","tag-queensland-news","tag-queensland-police","tag-sponsored-content","tag-sunshine-coast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}