Karen LaFace
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McDonald's Divers
U.S. National Diving Team
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||
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| Born | January 29, 1966 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S. | ||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||
Event(s) | Diving, springboard | ||||||||||||||
| College team | Ohio State University 1988 | ||||||||||||||
| Club | Pitt Aquatic Club McDonald's Divers U.S. National Diving Team | ||||||||||||||
| Coached by | Julian Krug (Pitt Aquatic) Vince Panzano (OSU) | ||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Karen Marie LaFace (born January 29, 1966) is a retired American female diver for Ohio State University and a 1992 U.S. Olympic competitor in 3m springboard diving. She later worked as a physician and coached diving in Ithaca, New York.[1]
In her early years, LaFace participated in swimming, ballet and acrobatics frequently, but always took an interest in the diving boards over the pool where she practiced swimming. With former training in acrobatics, she used to try doing flips on the boards. Realizing that taking diving practice would conflict with her regular swimming practices which she had grown tired of, she welcomed the opportunity to enroll in a diving squad at the University of Pittsburgh.
Laface began training in dive training around the age of 9 or 10, and by around 1980 was coached by Julian Krug of the Pitt Aquatic Club, who greatly improved her diving, and where she did nearly all of her high school training. By the age of 10, she trained at the University of Pittsburgh Pool, eventually with Krug by the age of 14, as the university had the only indoor platform tower in the area.[2] LaFace also attended and competed in swimming for Churchill High School in dual meets where in her Freshman year was Coached by Bill Griffith.[3] Her primary Coach Julian Krug at Pitt Aquatics also coached the swim team at the University of Pittsburgh. As a Sophomore at Churchill High, she won a WPIAL championship in 1982, and in 1981 had placed second in the WPIAL and third in the State Championship. By her Sophomore year, she trained with the Pitt Club, a highly competitive program, in the Pittsburgh suburb of Oakland, six nights a week.[4][5]
LaFace was state diving champion during her high school year at the PIAA (Pennsylvania) Meet and competed in the National Sports Festival in Indianapolis, Indiana, placing 5th in the 10-meter platform diving event. She received All-American honors as a sophomore at Pennsylvania's Churchill High School in 1985.[6]