By Josh Williams
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — The actor Edward Norton is teaming up with the New York Road Runners in an effort to raise $1 million per mile for charity in this year's ING New York City Marathon.
Norton, as co-founder of Crowdrise — a web platform that brings the power of social networking to fundraising and volunteerism — and NYRR CEO Mary Wittenberg want to get as many of the 45,000 marathon runners involved as possible in the fundraising. Their aim is to raise a record total of $26.2 million for charity during this year's marathon.
Last year, Norton ran the marathon on behalf of the Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust using many of the tools now familiar to Crowdrise. He raised $1.2 million in less than eight weeks.
"I'm hugely excited that NYRR has chosen Crowdrise to help them involve even more of the runners in that experience this year," Norton said in a statement.
The project aims to facilitate runners who want to participate, making it simple to get involved and to raise money for a number of charities.
Runners can simply visit Crowdrise's online source of participating charities, click on a cause they like, and then click the corresponding "Join the Team" button to instantly start fundraising with a team.
"When you're going up first avenue toward mile 20 and your hip flexor starts giving out on you like mine did, you're going to need something other than personal motivation to get you going," said Norton. "And running for a team and knowing you're being a part of this is gonna do it."
