The race was in its early stages but Michael Russell was convinced he couldn't go on. A cold front lashed the hills of remote northern Vietnam with icy rain and thick fog, turning the already rugged terrain into a treacherous morass of thick mud that enveloped his swelling ankles, stifling each step. Darkness and mist had covered the trail hours ago, and many more hours would pass before he walked the more than 100km that represented just the opening segment of an almost week-long course. He was beyond fatigue; every frayed muscle screamed at him to halt, to lie down right there in the muck and rest. The only thing that kept him going were his companions, who were every bit as exhausted - and the knowledge that if any one of them stopped, it would be a long time before someone came along to help them to their feet. Vietnam's Lao Cai province is a long way from the usual haunts of the 36-year-old Hong Kong-based Australian, a director with property firm CB Richard Ellis, and the Racing the Planet: Vietnam event, a 250km trek through the badlands near the Chinese border, was far more gruelling than the casual hikes and rugby matches that represent his fitness regime. It wasn't thrills or a burning urge to push his limits that took Russell to the Vietnamese highlands, but his two-year-old daughter, Isabella. The sores that dotted his feet at the end of each day on the trail were a constant reminder of her. Shortly after her birth, Isabella was diagnosed with epidermolysis bullosa (EB), a rare genetic condition characterised by the presence of extremely fragile skin, which is prone to spontaneous blistering. More severe versions leave children almost permanently swathed in bandages and unable to tolerate even their parents' touch. Isabella has a milder form of EB, which will make swimming or competitive sports difficult but won't prevent her from leading a relatively normal life. Still, seeing her struggling to walk on red raw feet and having to regularly hold her down and lance her boils to ease infection convinced Russell he had to contribute whatever he could to the global effort to understand and treat EB. When he heard about people tackling the Racing the Planet events to drum up funds for charity, his next move became obvious. Enlisting the support of co-workers Jennifer Hill and Jason Parry, Russell registered Team CBRE Blister Busters for the February race through Vietnam's scenic Sapa region. The money the team raised would go to DebRA, a Britain-based group advancing the cause of EB sufferers. 'I'd never done anything like it, or even camped out much before,' Russell says. 'I also have to admit that I felt really selfish; it's hard to weigh up what causes need the most help and you almost feel like you're taking money away from other charities.' Despite these concerns, the response was overwhelming. Reaching out mainly to family, friends and colleagues, the team made a good showing in the competition and has raised more than GBP25,000 (HK$385,500) for DebRA, more than twice the amount originally targeted. It was a tough slog but Russell has no doubt the toil was worth it. 'You're not going to get people's attention or elicit donations just by sending out e-mails,' he says. 'I don't mean to downplay other competitions, but people look at [Racing the Planet] and know it's something substantial, that we're not just going for a jog on a Sunday afternoon but really are putting ourselves through some pain. So I think everyone was a bit more generous than they would have been with something not quite as difficult.' It may have been Russell's first charity drive but he's worked out what's fast becoming one of the great truths of philanthropy; if you want to raise money, nothing works like an element of adventure - or, better yet, genuine peril. While few hard statistics are available, even a cursory look at the news headlines shows a growing number of people are prepared to risk life and limb to support causes they believe in. Canadian entrepreneur and fundraiser extraordinaire Eric Boyko has fought frostbite and oedema while ascending some of the world's most forbidding peaks, including Aconcagua, in Argentina, and McKinley, in Alaska, to raise funds for organisations such as the Alzheimer Society of Montreal. In 2006, in Idaho in the United States, Air National Guard captain Dan Schilling performed a record 201 jumps off the 150-metre Perrine Bridge with a single parachute - a practice known as base jumping, which had resulted in a fatality and multiple injuries on the same spot just weeks earlier. Schilling's stunt aimed to draw attention to a foundation assisting the orphaned children of fallen members of special operations forces. Students at Britain's Oxford University have set up a dedicated 'stunt factory', which draws money to charities through activities such as bungee jumping, street luging and fire-breathing. There's no shortage of examples closer to home, set up to lure cash to causes ranging from sheltering the homeless to saving endangered rhinoceros. In the name of charity, organisations are running ascents of Kanchenjunga, the world's third-highest mountain, on the border between India and Nepal, car races through Mongolia's barren steppes and treks in the lawless hills where Thailand, Myanmar and Laos meet, known as the Golden Triangle. Last year, in Hong Kong, a dozen finance professionals agreed to slug it out in a series of no-holds-barred boxing matches that resulted in plenty of bloody noses and about US$150,000 going to children's charity Operation Smile. Michael Nilsen, director of public affairs at the Arlington, Virginia-based Association of Fundraising Professionals, says charity events with adventure or 'extreme' sporting elements began gaining traction in the US at the turn of the millennium, but still account for under 1 per cent of all fundraising there. This is more than it sounds; according to sources such as the GivingUSA Foundation, Americans give away US$250 billion each year. Industry insiders say that while donors are as generous as they've ever been, there are more causes vying for their wallets - and their imaginations - which naturally encourages fund-raisers to distinguish themselves with eye-catching stunts. 'It's a more crowded market,' says John Sayer, director-general of Oxfam Hong Kong. 'As the media gets slicker, there are more messages crowding in on us, and to get anyone's attention certainly takes a lot more. Our message has to compete with all the other messages that are cramming everyone's consciousness all the time.' Brice Minnigh, who with fellow Hong Kong residents David Jessop and Stephen Wright has mounted a series of expeditions to raise money for organisations such as Orbis, a blindness-prevention group, is even blunter. 'We've noted in recent years that it's hard to raise substantial sums for charity unless the expedition you undertake is extreme, inherently very dangerous [or] potentially lethal. It seems that if you attempt something in which you stand a strong chance of getting killed ... it's, understandably, much easier to convince people to stump up large amounts of money.' Minnigh and his companions should know. Last year, they embarked on their most ambitious challenge yet, attempting to cross a frozen, 700km stretch of Greenland on skis and foot. They were forced to abandon the expedition after Jessop plunged down a hidden crevasse in the Arctic ice, escaping death only because a ledge stopped his fall and his teammates moved quickly to pull him out of the abyss. 'When I first fell I thought 'That's it, I'm dead,'' recalls Jessop. 'Then I realised I was actually hanging [off the ledge]. That was when it started really getting scary, when I had time to realise what situation I was in and how close [to dying] I was.' But Jessop's brush with mortality hasn't convinced him he should find other ways to do good. The trio is already planning to cross the South Pole next year. '[Danger] just creates more of a buzz around the event and therefore people are more likely to donate money,' says Jessop. 'Before you set off on anything like this, you have to be aware of the risks.' While independent operators are free to take their lives into their own hands, larger organisations tend to be more cautious, meaning 'extreme' events are not necessarily as hazardous as they first appear. The annual Trailwalker is the largest fund-raising event on Oxfam's regional calendar. Requiring teams to tackle Hong Kong's 100km MacLehose Trail, it is certainly strenuous, but it would be hard to deem it unsafe. The walk, which drew more than 4,000 people last year, is blessed with the kind of infrastructure usually reserved for military exercises - checkpoints, communications depots, police barricades and makeshift hospitals. While a few people drop out every year and plenty of competitors walk away with blisters, scrapes and bruises, Sayer notes there hasn't been a fatality in its 25-year history. The Racing the Planet competitions are organised by a Hong Kong-based company of the same name that has years of experience staging endurance events in out-of-the-way locations such as the Gobi Desert and Antarctica. Chief executive Mary Gadams says each race is backed by a support team of about 30, including at least one trained doctor for every 25 participants and a medical chest that includes everything from defibrillators to antidotes for snake venom. A dedicated, satellite-powered wireless network set up for the Vietnam race by technology giant Intel - which also fielded a team - ensured organisers had a steady link to the outside world. However, the racers aren't shielded from every eventuality - in Vietnam, Gadams' team had to deal with lost runners, stray-dog bites and a rolled Jeep - but she insists they had little to panic about. 'If you look at the setup, it's actually much safer than tourists going out and hiking in some of these places themselves,' she says. 'They're not going to have any medical teams backing them up or checkpoints where people are looking for them.' Of course, not every organisation ascribes to the safety-first philosophy. The League of Adventurists, a Britain-based outfit that has run rallies in Mongolia, India and Latin America to raise more than GBP500,000 (HK$7.7 million) for youth-focused charities, prides itself on a more unstructured approach. The company asks its 'customers' to sign a 26-page disclaimer, confines them to basic transport such as rickshaws and ageing Volkswagen Beetles, and sets them off on madcap journeys of thousands of kilometres with virtually nothing in the way of guidance or backup. 'We don't make any safety arrangements,' says founder Tom Morgan. 'Our adventures are designed to be just that, so organising a support crew would rather take the edge off things. People are made painfully aware that what they're entering into can be extremely dangerous.' While the rallies haven't resulted in any loss of life, Morgan says they've seen plenty of 'near misses', including a couple of armed robberies and a few competitors ending up behind bars 'in some odd parts of the world'. In addition to being a 'great way' to contribute to charitable causes, says Morgan, the Adventurists and other extreme events are tapping into a wider social malaise - a theory that the skyrocketing interest in the company's events seem to bear out. This year the Adventurists had 3,000 people apply for the 300 places available in its Mongolia rally. 'I think as our lives become increasingly sanitised, structured and safe, people are getting less and less happy,' he says. 'These days in England, you have to take a training course to climb a ladder. I'd personally rather have the potential of breaking both my legs in a horrific ladder accident than suffer the ... numbing drivel of a lesson on how to climb one.' Not every fund-raiser believes jeopardy sells. Local broadcaster TVB instituted a 'no stunt' policy for its charity events in 2002, after pop star Cecilia Cheung Pak-chi fractured her spine during a televised attempt to jump a car over five other vehicles to raise funds for Yan Chai Hospital. But a TVB spokeswoman says the amount of donations the company attracts each year has continued to grow, thanks to a new focus on 'heart-warming' entertainment that 'caters for the changing taste needs of the audience'. Whatever the motivation of those who enter or support them, many believe the link between charity and physically dangerous - or at least physically challenging - events is here to stay. 'What these types of events speak to is that people want to do more than give a cheque or money and call it a day,' says Nilsen. 'They want to get involved, [to have] more of a philanthropic lifestyle if you will. A key part of these programmes is that the participants have to raise money both to fund their training and the charity, so it's a way to get families and friends involved.' Gadams notes excursions can do a lot more than just boost donations. In Vietnam, for example, the exposure provided by the Racing the Planet event could lure tourists to the relatively impoverished north, and previously isolated villages are already benefiting from the broadband and computing infrastructure Intel left behind. And don't be surprised if Hong Kong becomes a hub of sorts for charitable competitions. Gadams says with its top-notch outdoor opportunities and transport links, as well as a sizeable population of professionals with high incomes and ample holiday time, the city is well suited to adventure and charity programmes. 'There's probably a lot of us feeling like we've been lucky in life, very fortunate to have travelled and seen all these places and wanting to give something back,' says Jessop. 'It'd be pretty selfish not to.' Adventurers such as Jessop speak of an addiction, a drive to 'push limits harder and harder' that means when someone's completed one challenge or hit one fund-raising target, they'll soon find themselves compelled to set new goals. Despite the discomfort, Russell completed the Vietnam trek, placing 38th out of the 48 who finished. Still nursing the scars from his escapade, Russell says the race was such a rewarding experience he'd consider doing another one. 'Not for a while, though,' he adds quickly. 'I wouldn't say I'm addicted by any stretch.'