It has certainly been testing times in Brisbane for the 2018 Etchells Queensland State Championship. This regatta served as a warm up for the main event, the World Championship, which begins on October 21 for the 95-boat armada that has amassed to find out who is the best One Design crew on the planet. Winning the five-race pre-Worlds (as the QLD State Championship is known this year) is Iron Lotus (AUS 1442). Olympic Gold Medallist, Tom King, skippers her with crew, Ivan Wheen, David Edwards and Greg O’Shea. They are no strangers to the podium either, having previously won the 2012 World Championship, which was staged off Sydney Heads. Owen McMahon was on board then, instead of O’Shea, and Iron Lotus has also won the prestigious Australasian Championship in Mooloolaba, as well as the fiercely contested Victorian State Championship on the testing waters of Port Phillip.