Project America Run reaches Sandpoint

SANDPOINT — Army Sgt. Rachael L. Hugo died in the service of her country, thousands of miles away from her hometown of Madison, Wis.. She was 24 years old.

On Thursday, an Army veteran planted a small American flag in her honor and stood at attention as the miniature stars and stripes fluttered in the lake breeze. He saluted and locked his eyes onto the small, yellow ribbon that bore Rachael’s name. Moments later, he turned to continue his journey in silence.

Exactly one mile farther along, the veteran performed the same ritual. Another flag. Another name of a fallen soldier who died in Iraq or Afghanistan. Another chance to turn a wartime statistic into the memory of someone who once lived and dreamed and had blood coursing through their veins.

There is now a long column of these little flags — about 600 of them stretching from the Pacific Coast near Astoria, Ore., to just shy of the Idaho/Montana border. Hope resident Mike Ehredt will cross the state line and plant more of them today, running solo for about 30 miles and stopping for the night in Trout Creek, Mont.

Behind him, 30 new flags will dot the highway; 30 more names will grace the landscape; 30 more lives will be remembered.

“I absolutely give them a proper salute and several seconds of a ‘Thank you for your service’ silent tribute,” said Ehredt, who set out on his cross-country trek on May 1, traveling alone and pushing a 20-pound running stroller equipped with a locator beacon, GPS system and an iPhone carrying the names of fallen service members in reverse chronological order.

Each time he stops, the runner scrolls to the next soldier’s name and marks the place, date and time that a flag was left in their memory. The information is then posted on a website so that family members can track the runner’s progress and learn where the names of their loved ones were placed in honor on the way.

Ehredt calls his personal mission Project America Run. Over the next several months, it will take him along the back roads and blue highways of the United States until he reaches the East Coast at Rockland, Maine. He started by dipping a toe in the Pacific and will end by doing the same on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. Behind him, a total of about 4,400 flags will mark his path.

Each flag has a number — starting with the most recent casualty listed when “Project America Run” began three weeks ago and working back to the beginning of the Iraq War.

There is a psychology to having the number decrease as he goes along, stopping at every mile until the last flag that he places carries the name of the first fatality from Iraq.

“That way, somehow, it feels like it’s coming to an end,” he said.

At the completion of every running day — which rolls up to the equivalent of running a full marathon and topping it off with a 5K race — Ehredt stays with host families that have been arranged in advance along his route.

“It’s almost like coming home at night, because there’s someone waiting there, someone who’s excited to see you,” he said.

One stay that he thought might be emotionally difficult turned out to be transformational, the runner pointed out. It was the night he stayed in Vancouver, Wash., with the parents of Army Cpl. Jeremiah Johnson, who lost their son and were eager to have Ehredt in their home. It was the most touching moment of the trip so far, Ehredt said, and became even more meaningful when he said goodbye the following morning and began to run through town.

“As I was coming up to the high school, there were 700 kids waiting for me,” he recalled. “The entire student body was lined up four and five deep for a quarter mile. I was pretty choked up by that.”

Ehredt’s send-off in Astoria was more than he ever expected, beginning with a dinner in his honor at the local American Legion Hall the night before he started his cross-country run and continuing through the next morning, when he was escorted through the city and onto the highway by members of the American Legion and National Guard, as well as a parade of motorcyclists.

Once the hoopla settled down, reality settled in and he began his daily routine of what he calls “punching the time clock and doing my job for eight hours” to put in the necessary number of miles.

“After about 10 days, the body kind of got used to things,” he said. “I kind of like doing 30 miles or just a tad under, but 32 or 34 is OK, too.” 

Going into Project America Run, Ehredt already had amassed more than a thousand miles as an elite long-distance runner. Since the early 1990s, he has completed the 250-mile Trans-Himalaya Run in Nepal, Eco-Challenge expedition races in Borneo and Fiji, and became a two-time finisher of the 160-mile, 6-day Marathon des Sables across the Sahara Desert. Beyond that, he was the 34th person ever to complete each of the four, 100-mile ultra-marathon races that make up the Rocky Mountain Slam in a single season.

As he crosses the 600-mile mark with another 3,800 miles to go, his legs and his gear are holding up well, according to the runner.

“It has been pretty darn good so far,” he said. “I’ve only had two flat tires and I’m on my third pair of shoes.

“Oh, and I’m up to over five gallons of chocolate milk consumed and I’ve found $2.43 in change on the road,” he added.

Ehredt’s supplies — including the bundles of American flags with hand-written yellow ribbons — are shipped to pre-determined drop points on his solo run. His most precious commodity, however, is provided at random intervals in unexpected moments throughout the day.

“It has been interesting to see the patriotism in these small towns — I’ll tell you, they are red, white and blue,” said Ehredt, whose route avoids big cities and major highways. “I get a lot of honks and waves as people drive by and a few of them stop to ask what I’m doing.

“Sometimes old vets come out and stop me with tears in their eyes,” he went on. “You can feel their gratitude and encouragement. I relish that now. It lifts me up and carries me through the next mile.”

To learn more about Project America Run, locate flags that have been placed in honor of service members and monitor Ehredt’s progress as he runs and blogs his way across the country, visit: www.projectamericarun.com