At age 24, she won the Binibining Pilipinas Universe beauty pageant in 1982, after being almost dethroned for her pre-discovery as a sexy lingerie model in a Girard Peter fashion show due to an immorality clause set by Stella Araneta. Lopez maintains that she was pressured to resign her title but refused. Lopez further gained notoriety when the famed mistaken question of virginity from Philippine judge and actress Rita Gomez (1935—1990) was attributed during her national competition (in actuality was for Janet Sales of Manila), creating an urban legend among beauty pageant connoisseurs during the 1980s. During her national competition, she was asked by American drummer Alphonse Mouzon regarding the independence of women. At her coronation night, her name was initially mispronounced as Maricar Isabel Lopez, later corrected.
