Tara Lipinski says she can remember everything about the 1997 U.S. Championships, when she became the youngest national champion at age 14.
The victory 20 years ago helped catapult her to become the youngest individual Winter Olympic champion of all time a year later.
“It changed my life in that moment [in 1997],” said Lipinski, now an NBC Olympics analyst. “That was when you talk about peaking at the right time. I knew when I stepped off the ice as a national champion, I can be Olympic champion.”
In 1996, Lipinski finished third at age 13 at the U.