500 Fly: worthy challenge or arrogant showboating?

A kid swam the 500 all fly in a high school dual meet yesterday. His coach was furious and benched him for the rest of the meet. One of my lane mates this morning, who was the Starter at this meet said that was showboating and demeaning to the other competitors. I disagree. Was that any more demeaning than swimming free and lapping people? Plus, I saw the flyer ask everyone in the heat if it would bother them. Even on the blocks he said "Are you sure you guys are OK with this?"