There Is No Pulling Rank in the Rink : Figure skating: Despite pleas from U.S. officials, Kerrigan and Harding will have to practice together.

Despite pleas by the U.S. Olympic Committee and the U.S. Figure Skating Assn., the International Skating Union informed those organizations Monday that the decision to place figure skaters Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding in the same practice group during the Winter Olympics is irrevocable.

“Remarks have been made that we aren’t concerned about Nancy Kerrigan,” ISU Vice President Lawrence Demmy of Great Britain said. “I think we are doing that by keeping things normal.

“We always practice as countries. If we change now, we create a massive problem. We might have one couple say, ‘I’m not skating with this other couple because her husband is sleeping with my wife.’ We might have one man say he doesn’t want to be with another because he is gay.”

Expected to arrive here from Portland, Ore., Wednesday afternoon for the women’s figure skating competition that begins Feb. 23, Harding is scheduled to practice twice the next afternoon with a group of five other women, including two Czechs, a Bulgarian, a South Korean and Kerrigan.

Kerrigan’s coaches, Evy and Mary Scotvold, have complained that she might be distracted by having to share a rink with Harding, who has been implicated by a U.S. Figure Skating Assn. hearing panel in the Jan. 6 assault on Kerrigan.

The concern of the USOC and the USFSA is that the pairing will attract so many media that the practices will be disrupted. Already, numerous television crews, photographers and reporters who usually cover the women’s competition are gathering each day at the Olympic Amphitheatre to see Kerrigan. She arrived here last Thursday.

“If we take (Harding) out of one group and put her in another group, it could be considered distracting to the other skaters,” Demmy said. “Why should we disturb those who have had nothing to do with this?”

He said the ISU received the latest request from the USOC and the USFSA on Sunday.

The USFSA’s team leader, Gayle Tanger, said the USOC and the USFSA accepted the decision, adding that the ISU guaranteed that one of its two technical delegates, Demmy or Chuck DeMore of the United States, will attend each of the practices involving Harding and Kerrigan.

“If they see anything disruptive, they will intervene,” Tanger said.

Demmy said he does not expect a problem between the two. “When you think about it, Kerrigan will be protected,” he said. “Harding will stay as far away as she possibly can in practice.”