I hope one of the thing you discussed was the position of the start/finish line. Last year the start/finish was an obstruction and too close to the gate IMHO. All the boats were forced to converge on each other to go around the pins.

Having the slow course and the fast course intersect lead to interesting moments as well.

Don't get me wrong, I had fun last year, this was an epic event. But it was sooo crowded!

Has your club thought about splitting this event in two? Frankly there is enough boats in each fleet to sustain two events. A fast handicap one week-end, a slow handicap the week-end after? It will make for less people on the small pond at once, more flexibility for course layout (two parallel W/L course for example, send the one design on the left and the handicap on the right with a shared start finish zone) and only one race management team instead of two at once. Just a thought.