How do I get a sponsor for a charity marathon?

Would creating a fake charity to sponsor you for the New York City Marathon work?

• Answer:

  It might work to land you in prison. They need to approve any given charity before people can register via it, and presumably they're going to at the least confirm official 501(c)(3) filing status, etc. So to create the "fake charity" you'd be generating fraudulent filings first at the federal level. That's usually a bad idea. If you want to be sponsored by a charity for the NY Marathon, just use a legitimate one that already exists.