Wearing race shirts you didn’t earn

This morning a friend of mine told me his wife (who works for a race organizer) gave him an ultramarathon T-shirt. The ultra is a notoriously difficult 100K called the Nobeyama Ultramarathon and my friend is not an ultra runner (yet).

I jokingly said to another fiend of mine, “Check it out. Nobeyama veteran,” and that friend responded by just deadpan looking at him and saying:

“YOU DIDN’T RUN THAT! You can’t run that!”

A little bit harsh. But it cracked me up. 🤣

Personally, if I’ve never run a race I wouldn’t be comfortable wearing a race T-shirt from that race. Mostly because I wouldn’t feel like I’ve earned it.

What do you think? (Pic related)