On May 30, 1975, Pre left a party to celebrate the Finnish tour at Geoff Hollister's house at 12:15 A.M. with Nancy Allemen, his girlfriend, and Frank Shorter, his long time running acquaintance. He drove Nancy to the University of Orgeon ticket office where she had left her car. He then proceeded to drive Frank home to Kenny Moore's house on the top of Skyline Boulevard. Pre approached an intersecrtion with Birch Lane, a road familiar to him which he had run on many times. Before this intersection there is a sharp curve. Pre's '73 MGB crosses the center line and flyies over tthe curb. Pre's car hit the side of a natural rock wall and rolls back over on top of him. The MGB crushed him to death.
Pre was drinking that night, and the autopsy report revealed a blood content level of .16, twice the legal limit. None of the party guests remembered him being drunk or thought he was unable to drive. No one except Pre knows why that car veered off the road that night. Maybe there was another car, maybe he swerved to avoid deer, or maybe he was just drunk. The one thing were are certain of is that his death was a tragedy that shocked the whole world.
