Grassroot Soccer Co-Founder Ethan Zohn and ING NYC Marathon winner Meb Keflezighi are challenging themselves to a crowd-fundraising duel to benefit their favorite charities – and raise awareness for the dozens of official marathon charities – in their “Two Guys Marathon for Millions” campaign.

Ethan and Meb  will be competing with each other to see who can raise the most for his charity on Edward Norton’s Crowdrise.com over the next 30 days before race day on November 6, 2011.

Money raised during Meb and Ethan’s “Two Guys” campaign will go toward the 2011 ING New York City Marathon 2011’s goal of raising more than $1 million per mile of the 26.2 mile marathon in November for causes of every mission and size across the country.

Ethan is raising money on Crowdrise.com/TeamGrassrootSoccer for Grassroot Soccer, founded to educate, inspire and mobilize youth to stop the spread of HIV through education and life skills programs. He is inspiring donors with incentives, including:

  • Two seats in the Marathon Grandstand Reserved Seating Area
  • NY Red Bulls Soccer Tickets
  • Signed Grassroot Soccer Nike Dri-Fit T-shirts and Red Laces
  • Muscle Milk and SOYJOYÂŽ Product Giveaways

Meb is raising money  for The MEB Foundation, which empowers youth and their families to lead healthy, active, balanced lives through sports.

“This competition is all a bunch of fun to help raise as much money as possible for our charities and the many others associated with this year’s marathon,” said Ethan.

“I’m excited about winning the bragging rights for raising more money than Ethan,” tweeted Meb Keflezighi on his twitter handle @runmeb.

“Bring it on, slow poke,” tweeted @EthanZohn this morning in response to Meb’s tweet.

“Meb and Ethan are just a couple of examples of the countless marathon enthusiasts already crowd-sourcing donations,” said Crowdrise Co-founder Robert Wolfe. “We’ve found that people like giving to people, and when you layer in the fun of a Crowdrise fundraising page, it opens the door for the world to contribute to an athlete’s inspirational reason to indulge in some insane training and a hell of a long run.”