37-year old Portland resident Austin Crenshaw died Saturday morning from injuries sustained in a crash on East Haines Road near Corbett.
According to the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office, Crenshaw was riding downhill with a group of friends when he “crashed on a curve” and veered into the opposing lane of travel. Someone driving a car in the opposite direction collided with Crenshaw. Friends attempted to revive him, as did emergency responders, but he was pronounced dead on the scene. The driver of the car remained at the scene.
The collision happened on East Haines Road near the intersection with E Larch Mountain Road. This is a very popular place to ride as Haines connects to Alex Barr and the Historic Columbia River Highway. I’ve ridden this exact same stretch of road myself many times (it’s featured on one of my RideWithGPS Ambassador Routes). It’s very quiet and rarely has traffic; but the curves are sharp and the road is very narrow in some spots.
(Photo © J Maus/BikePortland)
Advertisement
The last time I was on Haines Road I recall there being many potholes. So many in fact that someone had painted around them with creative designs and a rainbow of colors to draw attention to them.
KPTV has posted photos from the scene.
Crenshaw was an experienced rider and did a lot of racing in the singlespeed category of local OBRA races as a member of Team JVA. His Facebook page includes several photos racing bikes and hiking in the Gorge.
His father, Winn Crenshaw, posted this along with an old photo:
“Austin has been enthralled with bicycles since I gave him his first one when he was 5. He immediately proceeded to do dare devil stuff, fell and had a scar under his chin the rest of his life. I don’t know how many bones he has broken and how much road rash he has endured.”
I am so sorry to hear about this. My heart goes out to Austin’s family and friends. I’ll working more on this story tomorrow. If you were on the ride with him and/or have anything else you want to share about Austin with the community, please get in touch with me.