Following a five-year hiatus from the sport, Lopez made a highly successful return to competition in 1997, winning the all-around and vault titles at the '97 Pan American Championships.

Over the next three years she would become known as a vault specialist, winning gold medals on the event at the 1997 World University Games, the 1999 Gymnix International, the 2000 Pacific Alliance Championships, the 2000 Cottbus Cup and the Copa Gimnastica.

At the 1999 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Tianjin, Lopez placed 50th in the all-around during the preliminary competition; however, she was also ranked third on the vault, qualifying for the event finals.

Her eventual sixth-place finish was the highest ever for a Mexican gymnast in a major international competition, a record that stood for 19 years until Alexa Moreno won the bronze medal on vault at the 2018 world championships.

She competed only on vault, qualifying for the event finals and finishing in eighth place (she later moved up to seventh after Dong Fangxiao of China was disqualified for being underage).