Hi Scot: 

 When I said "look," it was a metaphore  no pictures.  However, this is a picture of the finish line for the Olympic men's single in 2000 .  You may see a slight wave kicked up for lanes 3 and 4  they are completing their strokes and their weight is in the bow, but no waves for lane 3 which is at the beginning of his stroke.  That ripple comes from rocking the boat forward and back. As you can see (1) the wave generated is tiny and (2) the narrowness of the boat cuts through the wave. 

 My understanding is that racing shells and kayaks are not fast enough, given their length and their engine, to plane.  With a racing shell, you can't tell if it would plane or semi-displace because the bow goes up every time your body weight goes to stern.  I haven't done too much with racing kayaks.  I have rowed them a few times (lucky not to have flipped), and rowed against them with me in a single.  Never notice any lift in their bow. 

 The following is an article I found which deals with wave resistance and racing shells: .  They use something called "Mitchell's intergral" to calculate wave resistance, and it is not until a Froude # of 3.25 that it has a significant effect, and even then, it is only 25% of the  the coefficient of drag. 

 A couple of years ago, I did a mock up comparing various boats (singles through eights), rowers (male, female, open and lightweights), and erg Indoor rowing scores (which can be converted to Watts).  It all fits nicely if drag resistance is the dominating force (i.e. square).  I've recently seen someone publish the same results. 

 There was a nice article in yesterday's NYTimes related to drag, et al.:  

 Back in 1984, a friend of mine built a platform for the TV crew to film the Olympics.  He used two eights to make a catamaran.  It could go pretty quick with just a small motor and made little wake.  (Any wake can cause a boat to mess up and would hinder the competitors unfairly.)  I think though that it has long ago been relegated to the junk pile.  Can't measure a real boat because it would be too unstable for a motor.  Also, the weight of the motor might cause some problems.  You'd also have to be sure that it is a no wind day.  Air resitance with no wind, is about 10% of the drag.  Never even thought about a GPS system  I've been out of the loop too long!! 

 The Proas seems to be built a lot like a racing shell.  I've also read a little about fine entry, and about Catamarans since we started this discussion.  (I've learned a lot, Thanks).  These boats all have a very large length to beam ration and slice through the water like a knife and all are noted for not producing much wake.  Best Regards.