Imagine a race where you miss winning silver by three-tenths of a second and can’t actually see your closest competitor. That is the beauty and the maddening nature of a head race, and exactly what the Vashon Island Rowing Club’s (VIRC) junior women’s quad had to contend with at this year’s Tail of the Lake Regatta on Lake Union last Sunday. They finished with a bronze medal in their race along the 4,000-meter course.

VIRC brought home 12 medals overall, six of them gold. The head races are especially challenging because rowers do not leave all at once. They have staggered starts, which makes it impossible for rowers to know how their boat is doing during the race, except to compare their progress to the boats immediately behind and in front of them. It means rowers and coxswains have to imagine a competitor at their side through the entire race and often not know the outcome until they come ashore.

For VIRC this year, the outcome was quite good for both master and junior rowers. Standout junior pair Rhea Enzian and Riley Lynch easily won first in their race, besting the two closest boats, both from Lakeside School, by more than 30 seconds. The junior women’s under-17 boat also won gold with rowers Maya Gould, Mabel Moses, Kate Kelly, Ruta Milewski, Sam Ziegler, Olivia White, Ivy Jaguzny, Brigit O’Rourke and coxswain Josie Slade. They edged out the closest boat from Pocock Rowing Center by just 1.4 seconds.

The junior novice women also earned first place in two races: Selena Mildon, Aria Mildon, Ava Lorentzen and Pippa Slade easily won the novice four with Hayden Rosen coxswaining. Rosen also coxed Lorentzen, Selena Mildon, Slade and B Timken to gold in the novice quad.

The juniors’ varsity men’s quad came in third in their race, but did so in an “open age” field that included juniors and adults, which made it all the more difficult to medal. A number of late changes to the lineups due to injury and illness also threatened to have an effect on results.

“Even though it’s been a rough week for the juniors with a lot of illness going around, they really fought hard and came home with a lot of medals and four first-place finishes,” head coach Richard Parr said.

Master rowers also triumphed on the open course looping around Lake Union. Mark Ripley beat 15 other rowers — even after the age adjustment — in a single’s race with a time of 16:45.2. Ripley went on to be a part of the mixed masters’ quad team that also won gold and included Mary Schemeta, Chad Magnuson and Lea Heffernan.

There were a number of masters rowers competing in their first regatta, which makes Tail of the Lake a bit unusual this year.

“Our masters program continues to grow,” Parr said, “and it was awesome to see so many racing not only for the first time, but having so much fun and being so competitive.”

VIRC’s next regatta is Sunday, Oct. 16, at American Lake in Lakewood.

After that, VIRC is hosting a two-week exchange visit with nine rowers and two coaches from Germany, who will accompany the team to Head of the Gorge in Victoria, British Columbia, the third week of October. That same weekend, junior rowers will also compete in the Head of the Charles in Boston.

— Anne Higuera is the mother of a VIRC junior rower.