What inspires a man to lace up his joggers and run from one end of the earth to the other? For Pat Farmer, it’s simple. Everyone deserves the right to fresh water.

Dodging polar bears in the Arctic, drug runners in Colombia and battling fatigue at every stage, Farmer is hoping to raise $100 million to help bring clean-water solutions to impoverished communities across the globe.

This incredible trek will require the 49-year-old to run two marathons every day from April 2011 until January 2012. Not surprisingly he describes the 10-month journey as “the most ambitious project” 
he has ever taken on.

Over the 21,000 kilometres he will traverse through Canada, the US, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia Ecuador, Peru, Chile and Argentina before finishing up in Antarctica.

Farmer says exposure to the elements is the greatest danger he will face, coupled with time limitations. “There is a very small window of opportunity in which I can get into both the North Pole and South Pole,” he says.

Working with the Australian, American and Canadian Red Cross, Farmer who served eight years as a member of Australia’s parliament, hopes his extraordinary journey will inspire others.

“If I’m prepared to hurt for a worthy cause, then surely other people are prepared to get by and support me with it,” he says. “I’ve seen firsthand what the real needs of poverty-stricken people are and I keep coming back to the same thing; without water there is no life.”

“A number of the television programs that will be filming me get to audiences in excess of 900 million people with a single episode throughout America and around the world, so all I need to do is encourage just one ninth of the audience to donate one dollar and we’ve raised the $100 million that I’ve planned to do.”

Winner of Achiever of the Year (2000), awarded by then prime minister John Howard, Farmer is no stranger to long-distance running; in fact he once ran around the perimetre of Australia in a record 191 days and has twice run across the width of the US, all in the name of charity.

Throughout his journey, the widowed father of two expects to churn through 20 pairs of shoes and 600 pairs of socks.

You can follow Farmer’s extraordinary journey in a live stream or donate to the Red Cross on his website poletopolerun.com