The hardest part of holding a protest hearing is determing what actually happened ("finding the facts"). It's common for the parties and witnesses to give very different and often contradictory accounts of what occured. That's ok. Honest people can see the same incident differently and honestly tell different stories.

There have been several different accounts given here -- too many for me to give an opinion. One thing I can recommend though, is for people to review the definition of "overlap". The rules do not define overlap directly. Instead, they define "clear ahead" and "clear astern". If the positions of two boats are such that neither is clear ahead or clear astern, then they are overlapped.

Boats that sail very hot angles downwind, such as catamarans, can easily be overlapped on opposite tacks a long ways before reaching the zone.

I hope that helps,
Eric