Historic Hood River
Tara Llanes
3-11-2025
Notes
You never know what you’re going to find when you start researching an image. This is from our large collection of Subaru Gorge Games slides, and bears the caption “Tara Llanes”. Tara Llanes was a champion BMX and mountain bike athlete for many years, winning multiple titles summarized here. In 2007 she suffered a paralyzing injury at a competition in Colorado. She set the goal of returning to competitive athletics. Within a couple of years she was playing wheelchair tennis, and then earned a position on the Canadian national wheelchair basketball team, competing on the 2020 and 2024 Paralympic Games. You can read an official bio here.
L. E.
I once watched a wheelchair basketball game. It was a bit nerve wracking. The players were just as intense and competitive as a regular game, but maneuvering a chair with wheels.
I could say, accidents happen to risk takers, but Tara even got in an auto accident while riding as a passenger and suffered broken bones.