The traffic actually wasn't bad - we could have easily taken his stern and tacked for A without worrying about anyone else had we thought that was the best course of action at the time - we were a gnat's butt from being able to cross him and had positioned ourselves to do it. He was starting to luff up as we got near him. With it being light, I really didn't have a good feel for how much the boat momentum would carry him. I got nervous so I called off the cross. We were pretty much left with the choices to do a hard bear away (probably not a good idea in that light stuff) or go for the lee bow.

If we were a little more decisive with our maneuver, we probably could have bailed out and gotten behind him for the mark without impeding another boat. As it was, however, we waited until it was too late and lost another boat in the process.

With regards to sailing a monohull, I'm thinking about getting more involved in our local racing scene...the luffing/momentum thing was different, but man, there was SOOOO much time to think about the tactics in light air close quarters and you can still maneuver - it's very different. and I really enjoy crewing - it was a lot of fun. We had a pretty good results too.