That fisherman was a jerk, plain and simple. The foul language was reprehensible. He over reacted in every way, and worst of all he gave his kids a really poor lesson in how to handle a difficult situation. He probably shouldn't have been sitting in the middle of a race course and would have had better luck fishing in another part of the lake, but... As somene pointed out, we're all out there to have fun. The racing rules point out that the fishing boat is an obstruction. You could have called for room from the other competitor, but with navigable water all around the fishing boat the responsibility is yours to avoid him. With lines in the water, he is the burdened vessel, even though it's not clear where or how long his lines were, or that he was fishing at all. Looking at it from a slightly different scale. If you were at sea on Playstation and crossed within 50-feet of a long-line fishing boat and snagged its line, you'd be writing a check for a lot more than $250 of lost gear.

Despite the fisherman's bad attitude, lack of character and poor parenting skills, I think he was probably right.