Tatiana Felixovna Lysenko was born on June 23, 1975, in Kherson, Ukrainian SSR. She is a Soviet and Ukrainian gymnast, who had her senior competitive career from 1990 to 1994.
Tatiana was known for her exceptional difficulty level and haughty style on the floor. She won many major medals but her inconsistency prevented her from even greater achievements - she was a serious contender for the 1992 Olympic title and 1991 and 1993 world titles, but mistakes prevented this.
Lysenko was a member of the Soviet Union team during the early 1990s, a period where their pool of talent was exceptionally deep. Merely to make a major team represented a huge achievement, since competition was so fierce (the USSR never lost the women's team competition in the Olympic Games).
She made her senior debut in 1990, winning the all-around competition in the World Cup. The next year she was selected for the Soviet team to the world championships in Indianapolis, where they won the team competition. She qualified to the all-around competition, ahead of her talented teammates Oksana Chusovitina, Rozalia Galiyeva and Natalia Kalinina, all accomplished gymnasts. However, she fell from beam and did not win any individual medals.
Tatiana's most notable achievements came at the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona. She represented the Unified Team (ex-Soviets) along with Svetlana Boguinskaya, Tatiana Gutsu, Elena Grudneva, Rozalia Galiyeva and Oksana Chusovitina. As expected, they took the team title by a comfortable margin. Another mistake in the all-around took Lysenko out of the running once again, but she later redeemed herself. Performing the most difficult vault in the entire competition, she won a bronze in that event. Then to the beam, where Lysenko performed a difficult routine immaculately and was rewarded with gold. By the end of the competition, she was twice an Olympic champion.
Unlike many of her Soviet teammates, Lysenko opted to continue after the breakup of the USSR, and represented her native Ukraine at the 1993 World Championships in Birmingham. She won bronze in the all around, which would have been gold had she not stepped out of the floor. Lysenko was the only ex-Soviet on the podium, a reflection of how the political upheaval affected sports.