Photo: Getty Images
Kami and Ben Crawford routinely share their family’s athletic exploits with their tens of thousands of fans on YouTube and Instagram, but their latest challenge attracted more criticism than praise. Last week, the couple took to social media to post photos of their entire family running the Flying Pig marathon in Cincinnati. There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with that picture, except for the fact that their youngest son, Rainier, is only 6 and the Flying Pig marathon is a whopping 26.2-mile run. The fact that he had to run for 8 hours and 35 minutes to finish the race was viewed by many as nothing less than torture for the young child.
… The organizers of the Flying Pig Marathon came under fire for allowing Rainier Crawford to compete in the race, despite the marathon’s age limitation, which usually only lets runners 18 and older participate. Organizers admitted to knowing of the 6-year-old’s participation and promised that the age restriction will be strictly enforced moving forward.
… Kami and Ben Crawford insisted that they only allowed Rainier to compete in the marathon with them because he begged them to do it. Except not really since it appears they bribed him with potato chips to keep running. They posted: “After 7 hours, we finally got to mile 20 and only to find an abandoned table and empty boxes. He was crying and we were moving slow so I told him I’d buy him two sleeves [of potato chips] if he kept moving.” Rainier crossed the finish line after eight hours and 35 minutes of running.