We did this through great crew work. We had a quick spinnaker set, and worked as a team. At the windward mark, we had a Catalina 27 inside of us who couldn't get out of her own way. She took us so far around the mark, that the boat just behind us cut inside and popped in front of us.
We worked our way to the next mark. We were definitely off on this leg, and it took us awhile to settle us down. We finally got to the layline of the next mark, tacked inside of two of our fleet, and gained the boat who passed us earlier back. We were hot on the heels of the next boat, and we made a fatal mistake. The course list we had did not list several marks that are always marks of the course. We had never been in this situation before, and we cut a mark we shouldn't have.
The rest of the race was fairly uneventful, but this didn't matter, we ended up finishing third, but we had to withdraw or be disqualified. We chose to withdraw, and so took our last throw out race. We now have to be able to finish all races remaining, and we have to finish these races in high places. We can still win the series, but we have to go for it.
While we made some serious errors, our crew work was very good. We made several flawless gybes, and kept the boat moving well. It takes a long time to get a crew together and working this well. We have accomplished it in only one half of a season.