Just a thought here. I've been watching a lot of IceNetwork.com lately (during my 30 minutes of rowing every day) and I've noticed that unusually colored and/or dresses that flow grab my attention. Pastels for sure. Normally, I try to watch footwork and form but when a skater is wearing a color other than black, burgundy, or navy, I find that I'm watching the dress more than the skater. Is it possible that judges get a little distracted, too, and perhaps miss some minor mistakes in the performance or test? Could it be that wearing black, which many of us do for testing, draws more attention to our mistakes which is why we wear it for testing and that, perhaps, it could harm us in a performance or competition situation? I'm not advocating hiding mistakes with color, I'm just curious. What do you think?
FWIW, I'm a skater who wears all black all the time and buying a colored dress isn't on my bucket list.