- YouTubers Ben and Kami Crawford entered their six-year-old son into a 26-mile
marathon . - The couple faced backlash from Olympic athletes who said the child was too young to take part.
Kentucky-based YouTubers Ben and Kami Crawford called out two Olympic athletes who criticized them for letting their six-year-old son run in a marathon, saying the comments prompted a "witch hunt" against them on social media and led to Child Protective Services visiting their home.
The couple, who have 47,000 subscribers on their YouTube channel, faced backlash after a May 1 Instagram post said their son Rainier, who ran the 26-mile marathon with them, "was crying" during the event so they promised to buy him a box of Pringles if he kept moving.
A tweet posted on May 4 from an account appearing to belong to Australian Olympic marathon runner Lee Troop did not name the Crawfords but appeared to reference them saying that the parents of the child were "bribing him to finish" with Pringles and adding, "Everything about this is wrong."
On the same day, American Olympic marathon runner Kara Goucher wrote a series of tweets that appeared to reference the Crawford family, speculating that letting a six-year-old run a marathon is "not good" for their health. According to Running Magazine, some experts do not encourage children aged 16 and below to train for marathons so as to avoid complications in bodily development during puberty.
—Kara Goucher (@karagoucher) May 4, 2022
On May 8, the Crawfords responded to the backlash in a statement on their Instagram account, saying the athletes used "their large platforms to broadcast absolute moral imperatives without nuance" and called for them to "take responsibility."
They added that Child Protective Services (CPS) made an unannounced visit to their house on May 7, saying someone reported they had dragged Rainier across the finish line "against his will." The couple denied coercing their child into finishing the marathon. CPS did not respond to Insider's request for comment.
In a Twitter statement addressed to Ben Crawford on May 7, Goucher said the pair had spoken via email, and that she did not question the couple's "motivation or parenting." Neither Goucher nor Troop responded to Insider's request for comment.
—Kara Goucher (@karagoucher) May 7, 2022
The website for the Flying Pig Marathon, which the Crawfords took part in, states the marathon is open to competitors aged 18 and above.
In a statement from May 4, the executive director of Flying Pig Iris Simpson Bush said the organization took full responsibility for allowing a minor to take part in the event and said the Crawford family had previously run the marathon as "bandits," suggesting they did not pay the entry fee to take part. The couple denied these claims in an Instagram statement, saying, "Every member of our family has paid for and registered for every race that we have been allowed."
Ben and Kami Crawford post regular updates about their six children on YouTube, where the family can be seen running and trekking together. In 2020, Ben released a book in which he said his family set the record for being the largest family to hike the Appalachian trail in Georgia in 2018, although there is no official page for this record on Guinness World Records.
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