Her international debut was at the 2018 Central American and Caribbean Games, where she won a bronze and silver medal in the 100 and 200 backstroke, respectively.

Lara attended Stuyvesant High School in New York City and was a member of the swim club Asphalt Green Unified Aquatics.

She holds multiple records in her high school swim team, the Stuyvesant Penguins, where she was known as "Krystal the Pistol."

She was a student-athlete and NCAA Division I All-American at Northwestern University on an athletic scholarship and graduated in 2020 with a major in sociology and minor in business institutions.

[9] At the VII Dominican Republic International Swim Open, Lara broke a 34-year-old record in the 200 meter butterfly with a time of 2:15.83.