Despite her petite stature, Tara Lipinski is a giant on the ice. A brilliant athlete, she is at home in a sport which has become more physically demanding in the last decade. In an upset watched around the globe, she won the battle between jumping ability and artistry to become the youngest Ladies World and Olympic Champion in 1998. The surprise of the late 1990’s in figure skating, she crosses into the new millennium as a co-author, actress, and professional figure skater.
Lipinski began roller skating before switching over to ice skating at the age of six. She instantly showed great talent, though she experienced some problems when her old roller skating techniques came back to haunt her during ice skating jumps. She first began taking lessons at the the Houston Galleria Ice Rink where she trained in the early morning hours before school. Making wonderful progress, she became the youngest winner of the US Olympic Festival’s Spirit of St. Louis Award in 1994.
Her parents hired Richard Callahan as her coach, which required the family to take out a second mortgage on their home and move Lipinski with her mother to Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, while her father stayed in Sugarland, Texas to work. The hardships became worth it when Lipinski became the youngest woman to win the World Championships in 1997, breaking the legendary Sonja Henie’s record set exactly 50 years earlier. This victory, added to her win at the US National Championships, quickl...
more